‘Dunkirk’ Grosses $9.6M First Day In China, Valerian’, $51.7M First Week

All eyes were on China this week as Warner Bros.’ Dunkirk grossed an unofficial $9.7M (including previews) on its opening day to take the No. 1 spot as we head into the weekend. It bowed on 15,500 screens and accounted for almost 50% of the total China box office.

Chinese audiences also shelled out a total of $51.7M during the first week of EuropaCorp’s Valerian: A City of A Thousand Planets run there. The film took in $1.5M yesterday after several days in release.

Internationally, Valerian has grossed $157.8M with a lackluster $39.8M domestic take. That brings its global total to $197.6M on a $180M+ budget. So it’s crossing $200M worldwide but will end up in the red.

The Christopher Nolan WWII epic Dunkirk, which has been marching well overseas, racking up a $240.1M international total as of last weekend, has reached a global number north of $415M so far. Domestically, it rose to the occasion with a $174.6M box office take as of today at the end of its sixth weekend in play.

The film also bowed in Italy on Thursday, racking up the biggest opening day for a WB film in 2017 there. According to the studio, the film more than doubled the opening gross of director Nolan’s Interstellar and is on par with his Inception. It ranked No. 1 for $778K on 606 screens. That was good for a 51% market share of the Top 5 films.

While Valerian bumped Middle Kingdom champ Wolf Warrior 2 from its No. 1 perch in its opening day (not unexpected), it has since slinked down to No. 4 in the country.

Valerian is still playing in 53 markets, where it grossed $59.8M this week. Russia’s cume is $12.8M, while the film’s fifth weekend in France saw 3.68M admissions and a total grab of $33.5M.

Nolan films normally perform very well in China, where he has proven his worth with sci-fi fare and The Dark Knight series. This one is a dramatic WWII film — a decided turn from what Chinese audiences are used to from the Nolan brand. Dunkirk has 437 Imax plays this weekend in China.

We will report international grosses on Sunday.