Transformers 2 does $60 million on opening Wednesday...

The official numbers are in, and it appears that Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen did $16 million in midnight showings (behind only The Dark Knight and Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith), and then an additional $44 million during normal Wednesday business hours. That's a second-best day of all-time $60.6 million. First of all, unless the film completely collapses today (ie - does less than $25 million, a 59% drop from the inflated Wednesday total), it will have passed the year's highest three-day opening (X-Men Origins: Wolverine's $85 million) before it even gets to the Fri-Sun portion.

Of course, we'll see if the Godzilla Rule applies in this situation, and the general word of mouth is not good in the least. Will the poor audience reception make an impact by Friday? We'll know soon enough. For the record, the previous Wednesday record was the $44 million that Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix grossed two years ago. Since Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince will not have the IMAX advantage that Harry Potter 5 and Transformers 2 have, it's doubtful this record will be broken anytime soon.

On a final note, we've only had five $50 million+ opening days, all since May 2005 (Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Spider-Man 3, The Dark Knight, and now Transformers 2). And now we have two $60 million days (number one is The Dark Knight, which opened to $67 million last year). Remember when $50 million in a weekend was astounding? Ah, the good old days...

Scott Mendelson