"Smooth story structure, perfect action design, imaginative hero gadgets, and a huge amount of groundbreaking technical use. Batman creates an unprecedented big-screen visual feast." - Variety
"Simon Westeros once again proves his genius-level filmmaking talent." - San Francisco Chronicle
"A superhero film you cannot miss. You won't regret stepping into a theater for this." - Los Angeles Times
"Or perhaps I can only think of words like 'great' to describe Simon Westeros' new film." - The Washington Post
"Simon Westeros perfectly realized the superhero I've always imagined on the big screen, and exceeded my expectations." - The Hollywood Reporter
"For comic fans, this Christmas will be a Batman carnival. For non-comic fans, Batman is still a film you can't afford to miss." - Chicago Tribune
"After watching Batman, I'm already impatiently waiting for the sequel, and… fine, no spoilers." -New York Post
...
The next day, reviews across major North American print outlets were almost unanimously glowing. The few dissenting takes didn't stir up any real waves. Based on aggregated media feedback, on a ten-point scale the film's composite score hit a dazzling 9.6.
At the same time, TV and radio shows flooded the airwaves with discussion of Batman.
With the film's reputation strongly affirmed by the media, massive communities of comic fans across North America organized all kinds of celebrations in anticipation of its release. It felt like Christmas had arrived early.
On Friday, December 22, Batman launched wide on 2,613 screens.
Meanwhile, the North American box office numbers for the previous week were officially released.
From December 15 to December 21, six new films debuted, three of them opening on more than 1,000 screens: Sylvester Stallone's action blockbuster Tango and Cash, Sean Connery's crime comedy Family Business, and Universal's family comedy Little Wizard.
Stallone's Tango and Cash cost $55 million, an even higher budget than Batman, and that was supposed to be a key marketing hook.
But the moment it opened, its word of mouth collapsed. Its aggregated media score was only 3.3, and Los Angeles Times mercilessly called it "a comprehensive waste of actors, time, and money."
Tango and Cash had originally been incubated under Warner's umbrella through the Guber-Peters production company. Warner dropped it to clear a prime slot for Batman, and it ultimately landed at Columbia's subsidiary TriStar.
Because of the one-sided negative reception, Tango and Cash earned only $12.2 million in its first week. With 1,409 opening screens, its per-theater average didn't even reach $10,000, totally unworthy of its massive budget and premium release window.
With $12.2 million in week one, and Batman arriving immediately after as a direct hit, Tango and Cash was now tracking for only around $50 million domestic total. Sony had expected big things, but with those numbers, the Japanese electronics giant's first major swing in Hollywood ended in failure.
And even with its $12.2 million opening week, Tango and Cash wasn't the worst performer.
Among the other two films opening on more than 1,000 screens, Sean Connery's Family Business opened on 1,201 screens and made only $3.19 million in its first week. Universal's Little Wizard opened on 1,155 screens and earned an even worse $2.97 million.
With all the new releases fizzling, the December 15 to December 21 chart was still dominated by holdovers.
Look Who's Talking, co-produced by Daenerys Entertainment and Warner Bros., held onto the weekly number one spot in its fifth week with $13.96 million, bringing its domestic total to $115.21 million.
The Gucci Documentary dropped 23% but still pulled $4.93 million, placing fifth. After four weeks, the fashion documentary made for brand promotion had reached $28.79 million, massively profitable relative to cost.
Scream 2, produced solely by Daenerys Entertainment, was in its eighth week and earned $3.98 million, ranking eighth on the weekly chart. Its cumulative total reached $100.215 million, clearing the $100 million mark as well.
Just as new films had previously avoided Thanksgiving's Back to the Future Part II, the week that began December 22 became an outright "Batman week." The only other new releases opening that week had fewer than ten screens each, barely even counting as counter-programming.
And because Daenerys Entertainment and Warner arranged midnight previews across North America early Thursday morning, Batman's media heat spiked again when it hit full wide release Friday.
In a hillside mansion in Bel Air, the date was already Saturday, December 23. After days of nonstop work, Warner Bros. CEO Terry Semel hadn't managed to stay awake long enough to see the opening-day numbers come in after midnight. But riding on adrenaline, he slept less than five hours and woke at 4 a.m.
Not wanting to wake his wife, Semel quietly got out of bed in pajamas and headed to his study.
He flipped on the light. A single sheet was already waiting in the fax machine.
He pulled it out and skipped the detailed breakdowns from individual theaters, going straight to the last line.
$15.37 million?!
For a moment, Terry Semel thought he'd misread it.
Tango and Cash had only made $12.2 million across a full seven-day week, and Semel had been congratulating himself for not taking that project. But how could Batman possibly pull $15.37 million on its first day alone?
Wait.
That number seemed to include the midnight previews.
But even then it didn't add up.
The midnight preview gross had already come in yesterday: limited showings for publicity in major cities, only $1.2 million.
So $15.37 million for day one.
What was going on?
In this era, plenty of Hollywood films didn't even exceed $15.37 million in their entire first week.
Or maybe it was $1.537 million…
That was even more impossible.
Forcing down the surge of excitement building in his chest, Semel grabbed the phone and called Daenerys Entertainment CEO Amy Pascal. Even though it was early, she picked up quickly, with none of the grogginess of someone just waking.
When she heard it was Semel, Amy went straight to it. "Terry, you saw the opening-day number?"
"$15.37 million," Semel repeated, still trying to keep his voice under control. "Amy, is it real?"
On the other end, Amy couldn't help laughing. "Terry, distribution is your side. You should be telling me. But I called Jim to confirm. Yes. It's $15.37 million."
Confirmation landed. Semel clenched his free hand into a fist. "Amy, I think we need to convene a meeting immediately."
While Semel and Amy were speaking, it was already after 7 a.m. on the East Coast.
Early risers unfolded their newspapers and saw the same thing splashed in bold, oversized black type almost everywhere: Batman's opening-day gross.
$15.37 million.
It knocked the air out of countless people.
After all, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade had set the first full-week record in summer with $46.01 million, and the media had hyped it relentlessly. Now Batman was already at $15.37 million on day one. So what would its first week be?
While all of Hollywood teetered between euphoria and disbelief, the film's fan base erupted into celebration when the number dropped. And plenty of people who'd had no interest at all got swept up in the information blitz and walked into theaters anyway, pushing the box office even higher.
A true phenomenon formed almost instantly.
After the $15.37 million opening day, Saturday came in even bigger: $18.23 million. On Sunday, December 24, because it was Christmas Eve and families were gathering, the daily gross fell sharply but still hit $11.96 million.
And since Monday was Christmas Day, a national holiday, the "weekend" effectively counted four days.
Compared to Christmas Eve, the film rebounded hard on Christmas Day itself, bringing in $14.53 million.
In just four days, Batman rocketed to an eye-watering $60.09 million domestic total, already surpassing Indiana Jones 3's best single-week record.
Across the next three weekdays, the film still held at $7 to $8 million per day.
By the end, Batman posted a jaw-dropping $82.39 million for its first week.
Looking back, that $82.39 million came with a cascade of box office records:
Highest opening-day record: $15.37 million
Highest single-day record: $18.23 million
Highest first three-day record: $45.56 million
Highest first four-day record: $60.09 million
Highest first seven-day record: $82.39 million
Its first-week per-theater average hit $31,530. The raw "over $30k per theater" number wasn't the all-time highest by itself, but considering it achieved that across a massive 2,613-screen launch, it left every comparable wide release in the dust.
Driven by Batman, the weekly domestic box office for December 22 to December 28 broke $150 million, nearly doubling from the previous week's $80-plus million total.
But because Batman alone swallowed more than half the entire market, other holdovers that normally would've rebounded during Christmas week instead suffered noticeable drops.
Last week's champ Look Who's Talking fell 22%, sliding to $10.88 million for the week and reaching $126.09 million total. Because of that decline, some trackers lowered their projection from above $170 million to about $160 million.
Stallone's Tango and Cash was already damaged by terrible reviews, and under Batman's steamroller it lost its audience entirely, dropping 36% in week two to $7.81 million. After two weeks it had only $20.01 million total, bleak by any standard. Its domestic projection was cut to around $35 million.
Even though Stallone's films usually did well overseas, when you consider the $55 million production cost plus an estimated $15 million marketing spend, Columbia would struggle to claw back the roughly $70 million total cost even after all downstream windows.
If the two biggest earners were getting flattened like this, you could imagine what happened to everything else.
And on December 29, with Tom Cruise and Meg Ryan's The Rocketeer and Steven Spielberg's fantasy romance Always opening, their prospects were now clouded by the long shadow of Batman.
On top of the $82.39 million first-week box office, the film's merchandise exploded.
Thanks to meticulous early prep, all major toy lines and the soundtrack were already shipped and on shelves before release, launching sales the same day the film opened.
Even with strong supply, the most popular items sold out repeatedly: Batman and Catwoman figures, plus several key toys like the highly visible Batcycle. Retailers across the country kept calling for emergency restocks.
Although multiple official posters were produced, Catwoman's popularity was so extreme that posters began disappearing after release. Some people even tried to steal oversized outdoor ad banners.
Warner's marketing department had to divert staff just to replace stolen posters.
And even the pure instrumental score, which hadn't been expected to move huge units, sold an unexpected 260,000 copies in its first week.
After preliminary counting, in the opening week alone, while the film earned a record $82.39 million at the box office, its merchandise sales were even more eye-popping: an astonishing $130 million.