The 25 Biggest International Opening Weekends of All Time

By Dustin Rowles | Box Office Round-Ups | April 28, 2013 |

By Dustin Rowles | Box Office Round-Ups | April 28, 2013 |

Dwayne Johnson and Mark Wahlberg topped the box office with a modest $20 million opening for the R-rated Pain & Gain over the weekend. While that is obviously one of Michael Bay’s worst openings ever, Pain & Gain also had a much, much smaller budget ($26 million) that most Bay films. Pain & Gain edged last week’s number one film, Oblivion by a little less than $3 million, while number three was 42 with $10 million. Meanwhile, Katherine Heigl and Robert DeNiro’s Big Wedding was a big failure, opening with only $7.5 million, despite a bigger budget ($35 million) than Pain & Gain. Where did all that money go? (Answer: Post-production therapy bills for the rest of the cast after having worked with Katherine Heigl for two months).

The big story at the box office this weekend was not in America, however; it was overseas, where Iron Man 3 opened higher than even The Avengers, $195 to $185 million. It is the 9th biggest opening of all time internationally, and it still has yet to open in China, Russia and Germany (or the United States, obviously).

Here is the new 25 biggest opening weekends of all time worldwide.

1. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 — $314 million

2. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides — $260 million

3. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince — $236 million

4. Spider-Man 3 — $230 million

5. Transformers: Dark of the Moon — $219 million

6. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End — $216 million

7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 — $205 million

8. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 — $199 million

9. Iron Man 3 — $195 million

10. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix — $193 million

11. The Avengers — $185 million

12. 2012 — $165 million

13. Avatar — $164

14. Da Vince Code — $155 million

15. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 — $152 million

16. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs — $151 million

17. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull — $147 million

18. Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith — $145 million

19. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey — $138 million

20. MIB 3 — $135 million

21. The Twilight Saga: New Moon — $132 million

22. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King — $125.9 million

23. The Matrix Revolutions — $117 million

24. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban — $113 million

25. War of the Worlds — $102 million