Finding Dory to open w/ $130m, biggest animated opening ever
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We’re hearing that Disney-Pixar’s Finding Dory is swimming upstream to a record opening of $130M+ for the weekend and today alone will clear $50M-$52M. These are off of matinees estimates from rival distribs. Dory‘s weekend opening will unseat the opening record set by DreamWorks Animation’s Shrek the Third which over its first FSS made $121.6M. Universal/Illumination’s Minions follows in the opening weekend record books with $115.7M, followed by Disney/Pixar’s previous champ Toy Story 3 which made $110.3M in its first three days. Warner Bros/New Line/Universal’s Central Intelligence is also poised to fare well with a $12M-$13M Friday and a FSS opening north of $33M.
In what is expected to be the second-biggest opening weekend this summer, Disney and Pixar’s Finding Dory started its climb last night grossing $9.2 million, a record preview total for any feature animated film. Not only does Finding Dory‘s Thursday night blow away previous Pixar records set by Toy Story 3 with $4M (Friday midnight shows, $110.3M opening) and last June’s Inside Out which minted $3.7M ($90.4M opening), but the fish film whips the preview nights of Universal/Illumination’s Minions ($6.2M) and Despicable Me 2 ($4.7M). Finding Dory will be the widest Pixar release of all time, playing at 4,305 venues today. Its 3-day take is expected to be at $100M-plus.
Unless I hear rave reviews about it or s/t.
