Although The Twilight Saga: New Moon took the midnight screening and first day records, it hasn’t quite continued its run to have the biggest opening weekend in history, although with $140.7 million in only three days, it’s now third on the list behind The Dark Knight ($158 million) and Spider-man 3 ($151 million).
It’s particularly impressive seeing as New Moon only cost $50 million to make, at least two and a half times less that the budget of Dark Knight and Spider-man 3. It gives the film a bigger opening than any of the Pirates of the Caribbean or Harry Potter movies, and more than twice as much as Twilight made on its opening last year. It’s also by far the biggest weekend tally ever for a film outside the summer months.
However New Moon wasn’t the only film celebrating, as the Sandra Bullock thriller, The Blind Side, got off to an excellent start with $34.5 million, above most people’s expectations. However with $12.6 million, the new animated movie Planet 51 had less to cheer about, although the movie will hope to keep an audience through this week’s Thanksgiving holidays.
Just to show how much the box office picked up this weekend, Precious dropped from third to sixth place, even though it actually made 85% more money than it did last weekend, as it continues to expland to more screens.
Despite some success lower down the list, the phenomenal $141 million of New Moon is the big news this weekend, showing that the franchise truly has become quite a phenomenon. Take a look below for the full US top 10 for the weekend of November 20th-22nd.
| Rank | Title | Weekend Gross (millions) | Total Gross to date (millions) |
| 1 | The Twilight Saga: New Moon | $140.7 | $14.7 |
| 2 | The Blind Side | $34.5 | $34.5 |
| 3 | 2012 | $26.5 | $108.2 |
| 4 | Planet 51 | $12.6 | $12.6 |
| 5 | Disney’s A Christmas Carol | $12.2 | $79.7 |
| 6 | Precious | $11.0 | $21.4 |
| 7 | The Men Who Stare At Goats | $2.7 | $27.6 |
| 8 | Couples Retreat | $1.9 | $105.0 |
| 9 | The Fourth Kind | $1.7 | $23.3 |
| 10 | Law Abiding Citizen | $1.6 | $70.0 |