“Barbenheimer” didn’t just work – it spun box office gold. The social media-fueled fusion of Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” brought moviegoers back to the theaters in record numbers this weekend, vastly outperforming projections and giving a glimmer of hope to the lagging exhibition business, amid the sobering backdrop of strikes.

Warner Bros.’ “Barbie” claimed the top spot with a massive $155 million in ticket sales from North American theaters from 4,243 locations, surpassing “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” (as well as every Marvel movie this year) as the biggest opening of the year and breaking the first weekend record for a film directed by a woman. Universal’s “Oppenheimer” also soared past expectations, taking in $80.5 million from 3,610 theaters in the U.S. and Canada, marking Nolan’s biggest non-Batman debut and one of the best-ever starts for an R-rated biographical drama.

It’s also the first time that one movie opened to more than $100 million and another movie opened to more than $80 million in the same weekend. When all is settled, it will likely turn out to be the fourth biggest box office weekend of all time with over $300 million industrywide. And all this in a marketplace that increasingly curved toward intellectual property-driven winner takes all.

The “Barbenheimer” phenomenon may have started out as good-natured competition between two aesthetic opposites, but, as many hoped, both movies benefited in the end. Internationally, “Barbie” earned $182 million from 69 territories, fueling a $337 million global weekend. “Oppenheimer” did $93.7 million from 78 territories, ranking above “Barbie” in India, for a $174.2 million global total.

The only real casualty was “Mission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part I,” which despite strong reviews and a healthy opening weekend fell 64% in weekend two. Overshadowed by the “Barbenheimer” glow as well as the blow of losing its IMAX screens to “Oppenheimer,” the Tom Cruise vehicle added $19.5 million, bringing its domestic total to $118.8 million.

“Barbenheimer” is not merely counterprogramming either. But while a certain section of enthusiastic moviegoers overlapped, in aggregate the audiences were distinct.

Women drove the historic “Barbie” opening, making up 65% of the audience, according to PostTrak, and 40% of ticket buyers were under the age of 25 for the PG-13 rated movie.

“It’s just a joyous time in the world. This is history in so many ways,” said Jeff Goldstein, Warner Bros.’ president of domestic distribution. “I think this marketing campaign is one for the ages that people will be talking about forever.”

“Oppenheimer” audiences meanwhile were 62% male and 63% over the age of 25, with a somewhat surprising 32% that were between the ages of 18 and 24.

Both “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” scored well with critics with 90% and 94% on Rotten Tomatoes, respectively, and audiences who gave both films an A CinemaScore. And social media has been awash with reactions and “takes” all weekend – good, bad, problematic and everywhere in between – the kind of organic, event cinema, watercooler debate that no marketing budget can buy.

“The ‘Barbenheimer’ thing was a real boost for both movies,” Goldstein said. “It is a crowning achievement for all of us.”

“Oppenheimer” had the vast majority (80%) of premium large format screens at its disposal. Some 25 theaters in North America boasted IMAX 70mm screenings (Nolan’s preferred format), most of which were completely sold out all weekend — accounting for 2% of the total gross. Theaters even scrambled to add more to accommodate the demand including 1 a.m. and 6 a.m. screenings, which also sold out.

“Nolan’s films are truly cinematic events,” said Jim Orr, Universal’s president of domestic distribution.

IMAX showings alone made up 26% of the domestic gross (or $21.1 million) from only 411 screens and 20% of the global gross, and “Oppenheimer” will have at least a three-week run on those high-demand screens.

“This is a phenomenon beyond compare,” said Rich Gelfond, the CEO of IMAX, in a statement. “Around the world, we’ve seen sellouts at 4:00 a.m. shows and people travelling hours across borders to see ‘Oppenheimer’ in IMAX 70mm.”

This is the comeback weekend Hollywood has been dreaming of since the pandemic. There have been big openings and successes – “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” “Top Gun: Maverick,” “Avatar: The Way of Water” among them, but the fact that two movies are succeeding at the same time is notable.

“It was a truly historic weekend and continues the positive box office momentum of 2023,” said Michael O’Leary, President & CEO of the National Association of Theater Owners. “People recognized that something special was happening and they wanted to be a part of it.”

And yet in the background looms disaster as Hollywood studios continue to squabble with striking actors and writers over a fair contract.

“Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” were the last films on the 2023 calendar to get a massive, global press tour. Both went right up to the 11th hour, squeezing in every last moment with their movie stars. “Oppenheimer” even pushed up its London premiere by an hour, knowing that Emily Blunt, Matt Damon and Cillian Murphy would have to leave to symbolically join the picket lines by the time the movie began.

Without movie stars to promote their films, studios have started pushing some falls releases, including the high-profile Zendaya tennis drama “Challengers.”

But for now, it’s simply a positive story that could even continue for weeks to come.

“There could be a sequel next weekend,” said Paul Dergarabedian, the senior media analyst for Comscore. “The FOMO factor will rachet up because of this monumental box office event centered around the movie theater experience.”

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. “Barbie,” $155 million.

2. “Oppenheimer,” $80.5 million.

3. “Sound of Freedom,” $20.1 million.

4. “Mission: Impossible-Dead Reckoning Part I,” $19.5 million.

5. “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” $6.7 million.

6. “Insidious: The Red Door,” $6.5 million.

7. “Elemental,” $5.8 million.

8. “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” $2.8 million.

9. “Transformers: Rise of the Beasts,” 1.1 million.

10. “No Hard Feelings,” $1.1 million.
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DALLAS — As the Taliban swept back into power in Afghanistan, in the summer of 2021, Fahima Sultani and her fellow university students tried for days to get into the Kabul airport, only to be turned away by gun-wielding extremists.

“No education, just go back home,” she recalled one shouting.

Nearly two years later, Sultani, now 21, is safely in the U.S. and working toward her bachelor’s degree in data science at Arizona State University in Tempe on a scholarship. When she’s not studying, she likes to hike up nearby Tempe Butte, the kind of outing she enjoyed in her mountainous homeland.

Seeing students like Sultani rush to leave in August 2021 as the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan after 20 years, colleges, universities and other groups across the U.S. started piecing together the funding for hundreds of scholarships so they could continue their educations outside of their home country.

Women of Sultani’s generation, born around the time the U.S. ousted the Taliban after the 9/11 attacks in 2001, grew up attending school and watching as women pursued careers. The Taliban’s return upended those freedoms.

“Within minutes of the collapse of the government in Kabul, U.S. universities said, ‘We’ll take one;’ ‘We’ll take three;’ ‘We’ll take a professor;’ ‘We’ll take a student,'” said Allan Goodman, CEO of the Institute of International Education, a global not-for-profit that helps fund such scholarships.

The fears leading the students to quickly board flights were soon justified as the Taliban ushered in a harsh Islamic rule: Girls cannot attend school beyond the sixth grade and women, once again required to wear burqas, have been banned from universities and are restricted from most employment.

Sultani is one of more than 60 Afghan women who arrived at ASU by December 2021 after fleeing Afghanistan, where she had been studying online through Asian University for Women in Bangladesh during the pandemic.

“These women came out of a crisis, a traumatic experience, boarded a plane not knowing where they were going, ended up in the U.S.,” said Susan Edgington, executive director and head of operations of ASU’s Global Academic Initiatives.

After making their way to universities and colleges across the U.S. over the last two years, many are nearing graduation and planning their futures.

Mashal Aziz, 22, was a few months from graduating from American University of Afghanistan when Kabul fell and she boarded a plane. After leaving, she scoured the internet, researching which schools were offering scholarships and what organizations might be able to help.

“You’ve already left everything and you are thinking maybe there are barriers for your higher education,” she said.

Aziz and three other Afghan students arrived at Northeastern University in Boston in January 2022 after first being taken to Qatar and then a military base in New Jersey. She graduated this spring with a bachelor’s degree in finance and accounting management and plans to start work on her master’s degree in finance this fall at Northeastern.

Just two days after the fall of Kabul, the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma announced it had created two scholarships for Afghans seeking refuge in the U.S. Later, the university created five more scholarships that went to some of the young Afghans who had settled in the area. Five more Afghans have received scholarships to study there this fall.

Danielle Macdonald, an associate anthropology professor at the school, has organized a regular meetup between TU students and college-aged Afghans who have settled in the Tulsa area.

Around two dozen young people attend the events, where they’ve talked about everything from U.S. slang to how to find a job. Their outings have included visiting a museum and going to a basketball game, Macdonald said.

“It’s become a really lovely community,” she said.

Sultani, like many others who left Afghanistan, often thinks about those who remained behind, including her sister, who had been studying at a university, but now must stay home.

“I can go to universities while millions of girls back in Afghanistan, they do not have this opportunity that I have,” Sultani said. “I can dress the way I want and millions of girls now in Afghanistan, they do not have this opportunity.”

Since the initial flurry of scholarships, efforts to assist Afghan students have continued, including the creation of the Qatar Scholarship for Afghans Project, which has helped fund 250 scholarships at dozens of U.S. colleges and universities.

But there are still more young people in need of support to continue their educations in the U.S. or even reach the U.S. from Afghanistan or other countries, explained Jonah Kokodyniak, a senior vice president at the Institute of International Education.

Yasamin Sohrabi, 26, is among those still trying to find a way to the U.S. Sohrabi, who had been studying at American University of Afghanistan, realized as the withdrawal of U.S. forces neared that she might need to go overseas to continue her studies. The day after the Taliban took Kabul, she learned of her admission to Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, but wasn’t able to get into the airport to leave Afghanistan.

A year later, she and her younger sister, who has also been accepted at the university, got visas to Pakistan. Now they are trying to find a way to get into the U.S. Their brother, who accompanied them to Pakistan, is applying to the school as well.

Sohrabi said she and her siblings try not to focus on what they have lost, but instead on how to get to WKU, where 20 other Afghans will be studying this fall.

“That’s one of the things in these days we think about,” she said. “It keeps us going.”
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The heaviest rain to hit the Atlantic Canadian province of Nova Scotia in more than 50 years triggered floods causing “unimaginable” damage, and four people are missing, including two children, officials said Saturday.

The storm, which started Friday, dumped more than 25 cm (10 inches) on some parts of the province in just 24 hours — an amount that usually lands in three months. The resulting floods washed away roads, weakened bridges and swamped buildings.

“We have a scary, significant situation,” said Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston, adding that at least seven bridges would have to be replaced or rebuilt.

“The property damage to homes … is pretty unimaginable,” he told a news conference. Houston said the province would be seeking significant support from the federal government.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told reporters in Toronto he was very concerned about the floods and promised that Ottawa “will be there” for the province.

The flooding was the latest weather-related calamity to pound Canada this year. Wildfires have already burned a record number of hectares, sending clouds of smoke into the United States. Earlier this month, heavy rains also caused floods in several northeastern U.S. states.

Authorities have declared a state of emergency in Halifax, the largest city in Nova Scotia, and four other regions.

The regional municipality in Halifax reported “significant damage to roads and infrastructure” and urged people to stay at home and not use their cars.

Pictures posted on social media from Halifax showed abandoned cars almost covered with flood waters and rescue workers using boats to save people.

Houston, citing police, said two children were missing after the car they were in was submerged. In another incident, a man and a youth were missing after their car drove into deep water.

At one point, more than 80,000 people were without power.

Environment Canada is predicting torrential rain in the eastern part of the province, continuing into Sunday.

“People should not assume that everything is over. This is a very dynamic situation,” Halifax Mayor Mike Savage told the press conference, saying the city had been hit by “biblical proportions of rain.”

Canadian Broadcasting Corp meteorologist Ryan Snoddon said the Halifax rains were the heaviest since a hurricane hit the city in 1971.

Early on Saturday, authorities in northern Nova Scotia ordered residents to evacuate amid fears that a dam near the St. Croix River system could breach. They later canceled the evacuation order.
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Any hope of a speedy return of the American soldier who illegally crossed into North Korea earlier this week appears all but dashed by the silence from the hermit state on the whereabouts of Pvt. Travis King.

“We have channels of communication. We’ve used them,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Friday at the Aspen Security Forum, explaining that Washington has been trying to establish dialogue with North Korea since the early days of the administration.

“Here’s the response we got: One missile launch after another,” he said.

As Washington awaits response to outreach through United Nations channels and its intermediary, Sweden, investigations are underway at the U.S. Army and United Nations Command, or UNC, levels to determine how a soldier who was supposed to be on a flight to the United States to face disciplinary measures instead emerged at the border of the two Koreas.

Counterintelligence personnel are leading the army probe in coordination with the U.S. military in South Korea, the Pentagon said Thursday, noting that King’s status is AWOL (absent without leave), or away without permission, for now.

The UNC, the U.S.-led multinational force managing the Joint Security Area, or JSA, through which King bolted, is studying the events of July 18 to “determine what policies or procedures are required to minimize risk to visitors in the JSA,” UNC Public Affairs Director Colonel Isaac Taylor told VOA.

July 18

On a day that a U.S. nuclear ballistic missile submarine made a rare port call to South Korea to coincide with the launch of the U.S.-South Korea Nuclear Consultative Group, Pvt. King, 23, was in civilian garb taking in a DMZ tour that included a stop at the JSA.

The Joint Security Area is iconified by bright blue buildings that stand on the Military Demarcation Line, the official border that divides North and South Korea, in place for 70 years since an armistice put a pause to the Korean War.

The compound is a popular tourist destination, with bookings often sold out for months, offering the novelty of standing “inside North Korea” within one of the meeting buildings. A tour of the JSA requires submission of additional documents days in advance, including a passport.

King, who was expected at his base in Fort Bliss, Texas, where he faced pending administrative separation from the Army for misdemeanors committed during his South Korea deployment, instead bolted into the North Korean side of the border complex about 3:30 p.m. local time.

He was laughing as he ran, eyewitnesses who were part of the same tour group said. The army private was last seen moving to the back of a North Korean building, then being driven away inside a van by North Korean soldiers, according to a report that cited a Defense Department report on the illegal crossing.

His motive for such a puzzling and dangerous decision remains unknown, as are his whereabouts between checking in for his Dallas-bound flight at Incheon International Airport on Monday and his JSA tour that left from Seoul the following day.

King had served time in a civilian jail in South Korea on assault charges up until a week before his scheduled flight to Texas, and he was facing potential additional repercussions at his base in Fort Bliss.

In interviews with news outlets, his family expressed surprise, his mother recalling she’d heard from him a few days prior and couldn’t see him doing anything like that.

“I just want my son back. I just want my son back,” Claudine Gates told reporters outside her home. “Get my son home and pray, pray that he comes back.”

Rare bolt

King’s dash through the JSA is highly unusual, with few precedents.

While over the decades there have been U.S. soldiers who defected through the Demilitarized Zone, or DMZ — the 160-mile-long, 2.5-mile-wide buffer running across the Korean peninsula of which the Joint Security Area is a part — this is the first time any person successfully disappeared into North Korea from the South while on a JSA tour.

There was one such attempt in 2001 by a German doctor-turned-activist, Norbert Vollertsen, according to the assistant secretary of the Military Armistice Commission at the time, Stephen M. Tharp.

Vollertsen was caught by armed guards before skipping over the low concrete blocks that mark the border, the retired lieutenant colonel said. His stated purpose was to start an incident to bring North Korea’s human rights plight to the world’s attention.

King’s run also comes as firearms and guard posts were removed at the compound in 2018 amid a detente mood between the two Koreas during the previous administration of South Korean President Moon Jae-in.

North Korean troops had been stationed outside at the JSA just like their South Korean counterparts, but the COVID-19 pandemic changed that. The North Korean government issued border lockdowns and stringent COVID-19 rules, so when North Koreans were spotted at the JSA during the pandemic, they were in Hazmat suits.

In November 2017, a North Korean soldier dodged a shower of live fire rounds by his compatriots, running for his life through the JSA in a bold defection attempt. By the time he got to the south side, he was wounded but alive.

Now, with COVID-19 restrictions and other fears at play, King could be looking at a more complicated processing reality, analysts say, such as weeks of quarantine before questioning by North Korean guards even begins.

Amid escalating tensions

While North Korea has yet to speak on King’s status, it did issue a warning this week against the presence of the USS Kentucky nuclear submarine parked in Busan, South Korea, presumably holding 20 intercontinental ballistic missiles.

“The U.S. military side should realize that its nuclear assets have entered extremely dangerous waters,” North Korea’s defense minister, Kang Sun Nam, said late Thursday via state media KCNA, hours before the submarine would depart.

Kang said the deployment of such strategic assets could trigger North Korea’s use of nuclear weapons, as codified in its nuclear force policy, if “it is judged that the use of nuclear weapons against it is imminent.”

The nuclear weapon trigger warning is mostly being taken in stride in Seoul, with some analysts saying it shows a North Korea under duress. Pyongyang knows full well a first-use case will almost certainly mean a mutual wipe-out, they say.

Still, a war on the Korean peninsula is a scenario the U.S., Japan and South Korea must be ready for together, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley said in an interview published Saturday.

“I think that the Korean situation is an area that the United States could — I’m not saying it will, but could — find itself in a state of war, you know, within a few days, with very little notice,” Milley said, according to the Nikkei news organization based in Japan.

For now, North Korea will have its hands full next week, in part, as it gears up for a second massive military parade of the year to mark the 70th anniversary of the Korean War armistice signing on July 27, which Pyongyang claims as its Victory Day.

Remembrances planned at the JSA on the South Korea side, however, have been canceled as the UNC conducts its investigation.
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