Tom Cruise may have been heralded as the savior of the box office once more after Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning succeeded where The Flash and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny to name but two had failed by not bombing, but the A-list superstar was simply no match for Barbenheimer.
In an incredible turn of events that was unthinkable a few weeks ago despite the massive levels of hype surrounding them both individually and collectively, Greta Gerwig’s Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer combined to earn upwards of half a billion dollars at the box office in the space of just 72 hours.
The former is already one of 2023’s Top 10 highest-grossing releases after bowing to $337 million, with the latter hardly a slouch in its own right after coming within touching distance of $175 million. However, there’s one country that couldn’t give a single solitary f*ck about the Barbenheimer buzz, and you may not be surprised to discover that it’s China.
Hollywood releases continue to struggle in the nation as audiences favor homegrown features instead, so Barbie opening in fifth place with a tepid $8 million debut isn’t out of the blue. Oppenheimer hasn’t even been granted permission to screen in Chinese theaters as of yet, and it may not end up playing there at all, so it’s patently obvious the planet’s second-largest market for cinema couldn’t care less about the double-feature that’s been dominating the cultural conversation for weeks.
Barbenheimer isn’t quite an indisputable global phenomenon, then, but it’s not far off.