“Captain America: Civil War” destroyed the competition in a huge opening at the Chinese box office.
Opening on Friday May 6 with a $27.7 million (RMB180 million) score that was the sixth biggest in Chinese history, the film hit full power on Saturday May 7 when it scored $37.8 million, the seventh highest single day in China.
It completed its three-day debut weekend with $95.1 million. Including previews, that put “Civil War” on a cumulative score of $97 million.
That means it has already overtaken the disappointing $95.7 million run of “Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice” from earlier this year. And it will only be a matter of one or two days before it overtakes the final cumulative score of $116 million achieved by “Captain America: Winter Soldier” in 2014. “Avengers: Age of Ultron” achieved $241 million last year.
Forecasts that Disney will enjoy successive RMB1 billion ($154 million) scores at the Chinese box office (after “Zootopia”, and “Jungle Book”) now also seem to be on more certain ground. The studio already has three of the four biggest Hollywood films this year in China.
The huge opening also puts some heat back into the Chinese box office after a chilly April that became the first month this year which failed to beat the numbers of the equivalent period last year. The first three months of 2016 added up to a 50% gain on 2015.
The massive performance by “Captain America” came at the expense of films already on release. On Friday and Saturday its market share was over 85%.
Chinese romance “Book of Love,” which had opened strongly the previous holiday weekend dropped from $53.4 million to just $12.7 million. It now stands on $97.8 million after 10 days.
“Jungle Book” finished the weekend in third place. Its cumulative score is $148 million after 23 days.
