Summit Entertainment’s The Twilight Saga: Eclipse scored record-breaking totals when it kicked off the Fourth of July movie weekend with Tuesday midnight shows at more than 4,000 theaters.  Eclipse brought in more than $30 million, shattering the previous record total of its predecessor, The Twilight Saga: New Moon, which earned $26.2 million.

The question now becomes whether or not Eclipse will be able to keep up its blistering pace through the long Fourth of July weekend that also includes a Monday holiday.   Eclipse will expand to a record 4,437 locations on Friday, but it will have to do battle with Paramount’s 3-D epic, The Last Airbender, which opens at just 3,169 theaters, but which will have the advantage of higher ticket prices.

Weekend audiences could divide along gender lines with the Twilight film attracting the majority of distaff moviegoers.  The Twilight films have become major phenomenons with fans camping out to secure prime seats at the midnight showings.  Summit has already decided to split the adaptation of the final book in Stephenie Meyer’s series into two films in order to double the revenue and prolong the franchise (see “Twilight Finale a Two-Parter”).  With mega sales in multiple channels Yen Press’ Twilight Graphic Novel is the bestselling “Genre Graphic Novel” of 2010 so far according to ICv2.