Columbia Pictures
The Amazing Spider-Man was more sequel than reboot in its midnight debut.
The Andrew Garfield-Emma Stone film took in an estimated $7.5 million early Tuesday, equaling the witching-hour take of the biggest-opening Tobey Maguire-Kirsten Dunst adventure, the franchise's studio reported this morning.
"We had a fantastic start," Sony's Steve Elzer announced in an email.
Amazing Spider-Man's midnight performance is the summer's best since The Avengers blew out the lights in May.
Among more recent releases, Ridley Scott's Prometheus grossed $3.6 million in opening-night 12 a.m. screenings; last weekend's box-office champ, Ted, took in $2.6 million.
Heading into The Amazing Spider-Man's debut, Sony had been projecting a six-day, Tuesday-Sunday gross of $110 million-$120 million—a take that'd be big for a superhero reboot, but a guestimate that might not be big enough considering the midnight performance.
"I think portends a bigger opening week than was first expected," Hollywood.com box-office analyst Paul Dergarabedian said.
Spider-Man 3, the final Maguire-Dunst film, released in 2007, scored $7.5 million in midnight screenings, en route to a franchise-best $151.1 million three-day, opening weekend.
Here's a recap of the top 10 all-time midnight debuts, per Hollywood.com stats:
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, $43.5 million
- The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn—Part 1, $30.3 million
- The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, $30 million
- The Twilight Saga: New Moon, $26.3 million
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1, $24 million
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, $22.2 million
- The Hunger Games, $19.7 million
- The Avengers, $18.7 million
- The Dark Knight, $18.5 million
- Star Wars: Episode III—Revenge of the Sith, $16.9 million