Warner Bros., the movie’s distributor, reports that only 17 days after its debut, the Barbie movie has surpassed the $1 billion milestone.
The movie will end the weekend with $1.03 billion (£808 million) in ticket sales worldwide, according to a statement released on Sunday.
It indicates that Greta Gerwig is the first female director to accomplish the feat on her own.
It was dubbed a “watershed moment” by Warner Bros.
According to Jeff Goldstein, head of domestic distribution in the US, “No-one but Greta Gerwig could have brought this cross-generational icon and her world to life in such a funny, emotional, and entertaining story… literally turning the entire world pink.”
After the movie business struggled as a result of pandemic lockdowns and competition from streamers, he claimed that lengthy lineups at the movies and return visits “prove that movies are back.”
The co-chairs and heads of Warner Bros Motion Picture Group, Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy, said that viewers were “embracing the Barbie movie in a profound way.”
Critics have praised the pink-hued movie, and scores of people have taken photographs in front of the doll boxes that have been set up at theaters all around the UK.
It has earned $459 million in the United States and $572 million elsewhere thanks to Margot Robbie as Barbie and Ryan Gosling as Ken.
It takes a lot of effort to reach “Barbillion,” as Warner Bros. describes it. Only five other movies—The Super Mario Brothers Movie earlier this year, Spider-Man: No Way Home, Top Gun: Maverick, Jurassic World Dominion, and the Avatar sequel—have achieved this feat since the pandemic.
Cinemagoers frequently watch Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, a film about the creation of the first atomic weapon, after seeing Barbie, which depicts the coming-of-age tale of the famed doll.
The theater chain Vue, situated in the UK, recently reported that both movies were responsible for the company’s busiest weekend in four years.
One of the producers of Barbie was Margot Robbie. She anticipated making a billion dollars in the first few sessions, according to an interview with Collider.
We had a movie to make, she said, adding, “I think I told them that it’d make a billion dollars, which maybe I was overselling, but we had a movie to make, okay?!”
Pink billboards have been placed in locations all around the world as part of the film’s massive marketing push, and a pink Tardis has also been spotted near Tower Bridge.
Mattel, a toy manufacturer, wants to have similar success with other movies.
Future Hollywood films are expected to include characters from other Mattel companies, such as Barney, Hot Wheels, and Polly Pocket.
Although it recently revealed that its revenues declined by 12% for the three months to the end of June, it nonetheless entered into more than 165 consumer goods collaborations and issued a soundtrack record for the Barbie movie.
