In spite of a non-stop pummeling from the critics and calls for boycotts from some religious leaders, Ron Howard's adaptation of The Da Vinci Code posted the biggest opening of the year so far, earning an estimated $77 million over the weekend. 

 

It's an established fact that bad reviews have little effect on action pictures and horror films, but many industry analysts thought the negative critical notices would have an impact on The Da Vinci Code given the older, more literate character of the film's potential audience.  Oops, wrong again, Howard's $125 million-film earned a stellar $20,615 per venue and an astounding $224 million worldwide., a performance that trails only Star Wars Episode III's $253 million global opening. 

 

The question for Howard's film will be, can it sustain itself in the coming week -- filmgoers on Yahoo only gave the movie a B- grade, so word-of-mouth may not help.

 

In addition to a number of board games based on (or inspired by) Dan Brown's mega-seller (see 'Da Vinci Code Tie-In Games'), there are an increasing number of 'ecclesiastical thrillers' aimed at The Da Vinci Code audience including Paul Jenkins' Revelations graphic novel, which is due out from Dark Horse in July.

 

Dreamworks' computer-animated Over the Hedge, which is based on the excellent newspaper comic strip by Michael Fry and T. Lewis, also managed to post a powerful debut, earning an estimated $37.2 million.  Look for Over the Hedge to demonstrate solid 'legs' over the next few weeks with a dearth of competition from new family-oriented movies (and don't forget Stuffed Animals, the latest Over the Hedge cartoon collection, which debuted in March). 

 

Together The Da Vinci Code and Over the Hedge pushed the weekend box office total to a new high for 2006 (though it trails the same weekend in 2005 by 3% thanks to Star Wars Episode III's mega-debut last year).

 

Paramount's Mission: Impossible III dropped 56% in its third week of release, and is clearly going to be the lowest grossing film in the MI series, but its performance so far has been stellar when compared with Warner Bros.  Poseidon, which sank 58.5% in its second weekend and has earned only $36.7 million so far against a cost that was reportedly in excess of $160 million.

 

Faring even worse was Terry Zwigoff and Dan Clowes' Art School Confidential, which slipped 61% (and lost 304 screens) in its third week of release.  It looks as if ASC will have to find its hip audience on DVD.