Barbie’s historic milestone leaves studio ‘speechless’
Barbie director Greta Gerwig has made history thanks to Barbie‘s phenomenal box-office success, while Oppenheimer has notched its own “astonishing” milestone.
After three weeks at the cinemas, Barbie has made over US$1 billion ($1.5 billion) in ticket sales globally, making Gerwig the first solo female director to reach this milestone.
Barbie surpasses Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman, which brought in $US821.8 million ($1.2 billion) globally.
Oppenheimer, the other half of the sensation known as ‘Barbenheimer’ isn’t doing too badly at the box office either.
Christopher Nolan’s film of the father of the atomic bomb, J Robert Oppenheimer, over $552.9 million ($A839.5 million) worldwide.
This means Oppenheimer is now the highest grossing film about World War II.
Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore, was quoted by CNN as saying Oppenheimer’s achievement was pretty astonishing given it runs for three hours and is a very dark movie given the subject matter.
Nolan’s blockbuster follows the titular Oppenheimer as he works with some of the world’s best minds to create the atomic bomb, that would go on to devastate the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the culmination of the Second World War.
In modern cinema history, only 53 movies have made over $1 billion, not accounting for inflation.
There are just three movies that have been co-directed by women that are still ahead of Barbie, including Frozen ($A1.9 billion) and Frozen 2 ($A2.2 billion ) – both co-directed by Jennifer Lee – and Captain Marvel ($1.6 billion dollars), co-directed by Anna Boden.
There were sparkling dance numbers, funny moments and feminist tones that angered some, but overall, critics and audiences alike enjoyed Barbie.
For the past couple of weeks, Barbie has been competing against Oppenheimer.
On opening weekend, Barbie quickly emerged as the front-runner and even as new films like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem and Meg 2: The Trench, were added to cinema’s timetables.
The Barbie movies Instagram account thanked its fans for helping it reach the milestone.
“Here’s to our incredible Barbies and Kens from all around the world for making our Barbie dreams come true,” it said in a post.
“We’re excited to share that #BarbieTheMovie has hit $1 Billion at the Global Box Office.”
Margot Robbie’s ‘Barbie’ is a winner at the box office.
Barbie blows optimistic predictions “out of the water”
Jeff Goldstein and Andrew Cripps, who oversee domestic and international distribution for Warner Bros, the studio that produced Barbie.
In a joint statement, they said even they were “speechless”.
“As distribution chiefs, we’re not often rendered speechless by a film’s performance, but Barbillion has blown even our most optimistic predictions out of the water,” they said.
Barbie‘s strong performance is also most likely very good news for Mattel, the makes of the iconic doll, who plan on creating their own cinematic universe.
Mattel has several projects in the works that will focus on some of their most iconic toys, with major stars attached to projects, like Tom Hanks, Lily Collins and Vin Diesel.
Gerwig has not yet responded to the news of Barbie making over $1 billion worldwide. However, she did celebrate her 40th birthday in Barbie style thanks to Gosling.
A flashmob, organised by Gosling, surprised the director and writer by dancing to some of the movie’s biggest hits, while Gerwig appeared quite emotional.
Oppenheimer surpasses $500 million
The other half of the sensation known as Barbenheimer isn’t doing too bad at the box office either.
Christopher Nolan’s film based on the making of the atomic bomb has made over $552.9 million ($A839.5 million) worldwide.
This means Oppenheimer is now the highest grossing film about World War II, CNN reported.
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