The latest Bond film, Spectre, has been put under a lot of pressure to do better than previous Bond film Skyfall in terms of the box office. Whilst Spectre may not have lived up to Skyfall’s initial domestic takings in the US, bringing in $73 million as opposed to Skyfall’s $88.4 million, the first numbers for the global box office may show more promise.
Across 78 territories the 24th 007 action film has brought in $117.8 million, placing Spectre at the top of the global box office chart. Whilst the opening weekend numbers were lower than may have been anticipated this may have something to do with the competition, with the Peanuts Movie taking a $45 million chunk of the box office. Something Skyfall didn’t have to compete with.
Although the box office takings are impressive, they still don’t match the huge price tag on the production of Spectre. It cost an estimated $250 million to produce the film, bringing back the Skyfall team of Daniel Craig and director Sam Mendes. Skyfall became the first Bond film to gross over $1 billion and Spectre may well be heading the same way.
So far, Spectre has grossed $300 million worldwide with several foreign markets still on the list to get the film such as China, Australia and Japan. China may be the deal breaker having been furiously increasing its cinema industry. Skyfall took just over $59 million in China on its release and if inflation and Spectre’s marketing campaign is anything to go by this could result in Spectre dwarfing Skyfall’s impressive haul.
With the Peanuts Movie coming in second place in the Global Box Office, third place went to ‘Ex Files 2: The Back Up Strikes Back’, a Chinese romantic comedy which made $17 million. Fourth place went to ghoulish animated sequel Hotel Transylvania 2 which made $15 million pushing its overall gross to $404.2 million. This overtook the original film Hotel Transylvania which made $358.4 million globally. The adventure epic Everest completed the top five global box office films making $13.1 million globally, making $190.9 million overall.
It remains to be seen if Spectre will break the $1 billion mark and overtake Skyfall’s overall record breaking earnings, however the latest numbers show that the film is headed in the right direction.
