“M:I-2” blew into cinemas across the United States on Wednesday to the tune of $12.5 million. That’s not a new record, but hey, it’s not half bad, either. The new Tom Cruise flick posted the fourth-largest box office gross in history for a movie that opened on a Wednesday. The only films that have made bigger bank on hump day are “Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace,” which holds the all-time single-day gross record with $28.5 mil; “Independence Day,” which debuted with $17.4 mil in 1996; and “Men in Black,” which made $14.1 mil on its Wednesday bow in 1997.
“This is tremendous,” Paul Dergarabedian, president of box office tracker Exhibitor Relations Co., tells Hollywood.com. “It certainly bodes well for how the film is going to do this weekend.”
For the record, “M:I-2” did set the record for the biggest opening-day gross on a Wednesday before Memorial Day. How’s that for useless information? And the film had already set a new record for the number of movie screens it debuted on (3,653), erasing a previous mark set by “Scream 3.”
Over its six-day (Wednesday to Monday) opening frame, some pundits are predicting “M:I-2” could reach the $100 mil plateau.
In case you’re wondering, the original “Mission: Impossible” also opened on a Wednesday back in 1996 and made a respectable $8.3 million. It, too, opened during a four-day weekend and posted $56.8 million over the entire frame.
