Spinning The Box Office Results

The fact is this.  If you compare opening weekends here in the US, Pirates of the Caribbean 3 made less money in 4 days ($142 million) than Spider-Man 3 did in 3 days ($151 million). 

So, how does Disney respond to having the 5th best weekend of all time?  With class all the way...

Part 1:  We had an international strategy all along.  Who cares about domestic numbers?

Mark Zoradi, president of Walt Disney Studios marketing and distribution told the NY Times, "We had such an international cast, we had a story that wasn't landlocked to North America, so this was the absolute perfect movie to open on global basis. That was the strategy."

Part 2:  We don't care about opening weekend grosses anyway.  (Yeah, right...)

Chris LeRoy, Buena Vista's senior vice president general sales manager said, "I don't like to put too much emphasis on what the opening weekend means."

Part 3:  I mean... it was actually more important to us to break the (ever heralded) Memorial Day weekend record.

LeRoy, "What we wanted to accomplish was to break the Memorial Day weekend record and we're very pleased with that."

Part 4:  Spider-Man 3 had it easier than we did due to less competition.

LeRoy again, "Spider-Man 3 had a wide open playing field and, though the market expanded to a spectacular degree [this weekend], there was just more competition."

Part 5:  Remind everyone how big the previous film was.

And finally, from LeRoy, "I think it was hard to expect it to top No. 2 [Dead Man's Chest]. Market conditions change so much from one movie to the other."

What a steaming crock of PR hooey.  You made $156.1 million in four days (if you include the Thursday night previews).  That is an insane amount of money.  Own it.