Can ‘The Dark Knight’ sink ‘Titanic’?
Ξ August 7th, 2008 | → | ∇ Movie/TV |
Pet Rock: The Pop Culture Blog
It’s a third straight No. 1 spot at the box office for “The Dark Knight” with a weekend haul of roughly $43.8 million, give or take a large popcorn.That brings the domestic box-office gross to approximately $395 million as of Sunday morning. Between the time I began this post Sunday night and the time I hit the published button, Batman and the Joker probably toppled the $400 million mark.
We mentioned last week that “The Dark Knight” is brilliantly done, an island of blockbuster movie-making genius in an ocean of celluloid diarrhea. Even the ending made sense, which is something that has been sorely lacking in cinema of late.
With Batman making big buckaroos, it’s time to start wondering if Gotham can sink the big James Cameron-Leonardo DiCaprio boat. “Titanic” produced more than $600 million in box-office revenue in 1997, by far the biggest movie in history.
Mark Harris wrote in the Aug. 8 issue of Entertainment Weekly (the one with our girl L.C. on the cover) that it wouldn’t happen.
I say it does, and not just because movies cost a buck or two more in 2008. “Titanic” had the staying power, Leo and Kate entrenched at No. 1 for months, not weeks. But “The Dark Knight” has the Internet, Facebook, MySpace and fan forums.
What does this mean? It means the more people start seeing the numbers and the more us media folk raise the question, the more Batman fans will start organizing campaigns to see it a third, fourth and fifth time. Call it artificial inflation if you wish, but call it a record, nonetheless. (Boxofficemojo.com has the top movies all-time adjusted for ticket inflation. It’s interesting.)
There are no rules against multiple ticket purchasers. We’re fairly certain more than one guy got roped into multiple theater viewings of “Titanic” with his girlfriend.
“The Dark Knight” is two-thirds of the way toward washing away the immortal Jack Dawson. They said the actual Titanic ship was unsinkable. Look what happened with that notion.
Gotta love that line at the end…
