posted one of the best mid-week movie openings of all time and is on track to lead a record Memorial Day weekend at the U.S. box office, its studio and independent box office trackers said. Paramount Pictures reported Friday that the film grossed $12.5 million its first day in theaters, which ranks as the fourth biggest movie opening on a Wednesday and the second biggest Wednesday debut in the month of May.
The sequel also eclipsed the release of the first ``Mission: Impossible'' film by about $700,000, even though figures for the 1996 original include its Tuesday previews.
``M:I-2'' generated $8.5 million in additional ticket sales on Thursday.
``We're thrilled with its performance,'' Paramount spokeswoman Nancy Kirkpatrick said.
The record for the biggest Wednesday opening of all time is firmly held by ``Star Wars: Episode I -- Phantom Menace,'' which grossed $28.5 million its first day last May, also setting the record for biggest single box office day for any film. ``Independence Day'' ranks second for a Wednesday with $17.4 million, followed by ``Men in Black'' with $14 million. Displaced at No. 4 was the ``Pokemon'' movie, which tallied $10.1 million its first day. The promising start of ``M:I-2'' also puts it on track to surpass the $56.8 million generated by the original ``Mission: Impossible'' during its four-day -- Monday-through-Friday -- Memorial Day weekend stint in 1996, said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box office tracking service Exhibitor Relations.
With ``Shanghai Noon,'' the martial-arts Western comedy starring Jackie Chan, opening Friday, and films such as ''Gladiator'' and ``Road Trip'' still in theaters, ``M:I-2'' will have strong company at the box office. ``The depth is there,'' Dergarabedian said. ``You're going to have 'Mission: Impossible' at the top, but a lot of other films are doing quite well, and that should add up to a record Memorial Day weekend.''
The biggest Memorial Day weekend so far was in 1997, when ''Jurassic Park: The Lost World,'' ruled the box office by grossing $90.2 million of the nearly $148 million generated by the top 50 films during that Friday-through-Monday period. Dergarabedian said ``M:I-2'' appears to be the most recent example of a movie sequel outperforming its predecessor at the box office, reversing the traditional tendency of sequels to fall short of their originals. Other notable examples he cited were ``Lost World,'' ``Lethal Weapon 4'' and ``Die Hard 2.'' Reuters
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