‘Beauty and the Beast’ roars to historic $170-million debut

Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” brought so many guests to movie theaters this weekend that the live-action remake became the biggest box-office opener so far of the year, and the seventh-best debut of all time.

The picture brought in an impressive $170 million, well above analyst expectations of $130 million to $150 million. It’s the highest domestic debut ever for a Disney live-action title and the seventh Walt Disney Studios release to open over $150 million. The picture also brought in $180 million internationally.

“It’s incredible. It’s amazing,” said Dave Hollis, the studio’s distribution chief. “There are almost no words to fully capture how gratifying it is to see a result like this from a team that has been working on telling stories like this for years.”

The film, which cost $160 million to make, stars Emma Watson of the “Harry Potter” franchise as Belle and Dan Stevens (“Downton Abbey”) as the cursed prince. The story stays fairly close to the beloved 1991 animated original, a box-office smash that became the first animated movie to earn a best picture Oscar nomination. Directed by Bill Condon, known for “The Twilight Saga” and the musical “Dreamgirls,” the new film is well on its way to following in its predecessors history-making footsteps.

“Beauty and the Beast” is expected to reach the coveted $1-billion mark in global receipts before the end of its theatrical run.

Disney has built a successful business turning its old cartoons into live-action spectacles with “Maleficent,” “Cinderella” and “The Jungle Book.” The Burbank company is working on remakes of “Dumbo” and “Mulan” to continue the strategy. Dusting off the oldies can be tough, but filmmaking technology has become so advanced that the live-action versions can do the originals justice in the eyes of some moviegoers and critics.

“These stunning visual effects have been leveraged to transport audiences [into the story],” Hollis said.

Such technology helped catapult the film into IMAX history books. “Beauty” got $21 million of its worldwide gross from IMAX, a record for a PG-rated film, surpassing “Jungle Book’s” $20 million.

“Beauty” received an A Cinemascore from audience members (60% female; 50% families) and a 71% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Online ticket seller Fandango said the film is the best advance-selling family movie in the Los Angeles company’s 17-year history.

Despite the film’s massive positive reception, it did debut to some controversy. The addition of a minor story line featuring the company’s first openly gay character ruffled some feathers: An Alabama theater won’t show the film, Russia banned kids younger than 16 from seeing it and Malaysian censors requested the scene be removed. (Disney refused.)

Still, the picture has all the makings of hit that will continue to dominate the box office in the weeks to come. With the massive recent success of “La La Land” (more than $417 million in worldwide sales), it has proven that escapist song-and-dance fantasy still sells, even in countries that haven’t traditionally responded to the format. Additionally, following in the footsteps of “Frozen,” the hope is that the “Beauty and the Beast’s” classic songs will help drive repeat business, the way songs like “Let It Go” did for the computer-animated musical in late 2013. That movie eventually collected $1.27 billion worldwide because families, particularly ones with little girls, kept going back to the multiplex and listening to the soundtrack on loop in between trips.

Landing in second place in its second week was Warner Bros.’ “Kong: Skull Island” with $28.9 million. The film has pulled $110.1 million to date. Fox’s “Logan” took third place in its third week. The latest in the X-Men franchise added $17.5 million to its receipts for a domestic gross to date of $184 million.

The Jordan Peele-written and -directed film, “Get Out,” from Universal Pictures and Blumhouse Productions, pulled $13.2 million in its fourth week, for a fourth-place finish. The social thriller has brought in more than $133 million in the U.S. alone. It began its international release this week, grossing $2.9 million from nine territories, including the U.K.

In fifth place this week was Lionsgate’s “The Shack,” with $6.1 million. The film has received $42.6 million in sales in its third week.

The only other significant new release this week was BH Tilt’s “The Belko Experiment,” about 80 Americans forced into a sick social experiment in a corporate tower in Colombia. The horror film, which cost less than $5 million to make, grossed $4.1 million. It stars Tony Goldwyn, Michael Rooker and John McGinley and is directed by Greg McLean.

On the limited release front, Sony’s “T2: Trainspotting” opened at $180,000 from five locations, a per theater average of $36,000. The sequel to 1996’s “Trainspotting,” with a return in cast and Danny Boyle as director, has already succeeded in its home country of the U.K. with $21 million and has an international take thus far of $34 million.

Next week, options at the movie theaters will increase with the debuts of Warner Bros.’ “Chips,” Sony’s “Life,” Lionsgate’s “Power Rangers” and River Rain’s “Slamma Jamma.”

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UPDATES:

9:35 a.m.: This article was updated with studio comments and limited release box office figures.

This article was originally published at 9 a.m.