The cinematic gamble of Christopher Nolan's latest – an original, period war movie with sparse dialogue and little in the way of traditional hero tropes – is paying off so far. Dunkirk bested expectations to kick off at the American box office with $50.5 million, according to studio estimates.
Far outstripping the competition (even movies playing on more screens), the new film is a success for Nolan, even if it's not his best opening (that would be a little film called The Dark Knight Rises). In a savvy alternative programming move, Girls Trip also did well, earning $30.3 million and plenty of warm reviews. With a $19 million budget, this one looks set to be profitable and will likely spawn sequels.
In returning challenger terms, Spider-Man: Homecoming was the victor, slipping just one place to third and adding $22 million. War For The Planet Of The Apes, meanwhile, fell from first place to fourth, nabbing $20 million in the process. Homecoming, which had a week's head start is well ahead in overall earnings, making $251 million to Apes' $97 million.
The week's big loser? Bad news for Luc Besson, but it was sci-fi epic Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets. The film flopped on release, launching with just $17 million (especially painful given the $180 million budget before ad costs, which is already affecting the share value of production company EuropaCorp). Bad reviews haven't helped this one, and we're not sure we see Valerian 2 coming very quickly.
Despicable Me 3 tumbled from third to sixth on $12 million, while Baby Driver added $6 million in seventh. The Big Sick continued to perform, dropping a couple of places to eighth on $5 million.
Wonder Woman has finally begun to fall down the charts a little, but with the top spot among the year's superhero releases to date, that's not a problem. The movie earned $4.6 million and passed $389 million domestically this weekend. Finally, a 10th, horror pic Wish Upon made $2.4 million.