New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

My Big Fat Passionate Pirate of the Dark Knight

Kim Hollis: Since BOP's inception, the biggest box office stories have been Spider-Man, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, The Passion of the Christ, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, and now we throw in The Dark Knight. Out of these five stories, where does this one factor in?

David Mumpower: Ranking the big stories is always a matter of personal prioritization. Is My Big Fat Greek Wedding's $241,437,427 for a $5 million production evaluated differently from an $83,848,082 million opening for a movie utilizing a dead language like The Passion of the Christ? That's tricky. In terms of pure scale, The Dark Knight has obviously smoked everything else. In terms of best story, I still think what Mel Gibson's movie did shocked me the most. I thought Indiana Jones would win the summer and Batman would finish second. Clearly, I had high hopes for Batman that have been dramatically exceeded but $370,782,930 for a movie its first distributor refused to release is still the most remarkable story to me.

Pete Kilmer: I think the big story out of all of these is My Big Fat Greek Wedding. With its grassroots campaign that was a model for Gibson to follow with Passion of the Christ. It made companies realize that some out of the box marketing can make a big movie.





Brandon Scott: Spider-Man rejuvenated the comic-book genre and had a huge web of anticipation. Being a sequel, Dead Man's Chest is essentially similar to TDK with a large built-in audience. There is no denying The Dark Knight has been a massive success, but bear in mind it is essentially on pace to do what the 1989 Batman film did in adjusted inflated gross (roughly $445 million domestic). I would say TDK is about the third biggest story of the bunch. Passion was sold on controversy and being a subtitled film. I would probably have to say that was the biggest story with MBFGW second, being that it was an indie that blew up.

Daron Aldridge: I think it falls behind Passion of the Christ and My Big Fat Greek Wedding. I would argue that no one, even the people involved with the films, would have pegged Passion of the Christ and My Big Fat Greek Wedding as making more than 25% of their respective $370 million and $240 million totals. The momentum of Dark Knight is the most impressive aspect of its run so far to me. Spider-Man and Dead Man's Chest exceeded the high expectations but not on the scale that Batman has.

Jason Lee: I see The Dark Knight as the third biggest story ever. The two indies (Wedding and Passion) are more surprising than Dark Knight, which despite felling records left and right, still was expected to do huge business due to the massive buzz that's been steadily building over the past nine months.

Continued:       1       2       3