Crushing down the negative reviews it received from critics worldwide, the ambitious superhero face-off flick, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, made a thunderous global opening, minting $170.1 million in North America and an additional $254 million in overseas market in its first weekend. Now the movie is the sixth best opener of all-time.
The movie was made with an enormous budget of $250 million and a whooping $150 million was spend in marketing. From Chocolates (Cadbury) to Airline (Turkish Airline), maker Warner Bros left no stones untouched in marketing the film.
Not just the global market, the movie is performing very well in the domestic market. The movie had witnessed a wonderful response at the box office in India on the backdrop of the Holi and Ester weekend, earning around Rs 25 crore nett, including previews, making it one of the best first weekend in India in the Hollywood category.
Now the DC superhero flick is the fifth biggest overseas debut of all time. It sits behind only Walt Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides ($260m), Disney’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens ($281m), Warner Bros./Time Warner Inc.’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2 ($314m), and Universal/Comcast Corp.’s Jurassic World ($316m).
It also surpassed past movies based on the similar DC characters. It opened well above the $116.6 million debut of director Zack Snyder’s Superman reboot Man of Steel and Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, The Dark Knight Rises ($160.9 million) and The Dark Knight ($158.4 million).
The producer will expect their success to continue with its next superhero flick, the all-villain team-up film Suicide Squad which will hit screens in August.
As of now, all eyes are on Marvel’s next super-hero movie Captain America: Civil War, which likewise pits two heroes (Iron Man and Captain America) against each other. The movie will release in May.
BW Reporters
The author is Senior Correspondent with BW Businessworld
