Laura Carollo
Research expert covering cinema and film
Barbenheimer - statistics & facts
“Barbenheimer”, coined after the simultaneous release of summer blockbusters Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” on July 21, 2023, has become the movie event of the year. Despite their differences in tone and subject matter, watching both movies as a double feature on the same day became a must-see for many moviegoers. In a challenging post-pandemic context for the film industry that has yet to fully bounce back, Barbenheimer seems to defy the odds. What is behind this unexpected success that took the internet and theaters by storm?
A social media frenzy
On top of “Barbie”’s effective marketing campaign, the success of Barbenheimer is deeply rooted in social networks. Memes and collages of the dual release quickly became viral, along with the idea of watching them on the same day as a double feature, and the question: which movie should I watch first? Social media was the first channel through which audiences learned about both movies, as that is where more than half of moviegoers interested in “Barbie,” and about a third in “Oppenheimer”, heard about them.This Barbie is making history
The success of "Barbie" extends beyond social media buzz and ticket sales, with the movie becoming the biggest domestic debut ever for a female director. Greta Gerwig now takes the top spot, surpassing “Captain Marvel" (2019), co-directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, and “Frozen 2” (2019), co-directed by Jennifer Lee and Chris Buck. “Barbie” topped the ranking of the highest-grossing movie openings of 2023 with 155 million U.S. dollars domestically, an impressive feat given that female directors are still in the minority in Hollywood. While a relative improvement was noted in 2020 and 2021, the share of female directors dropped again in 2022. This disparity is also reflected in box office results, as all the highest grossing movie directors of all time are men.Oppenheimer, a real box office explosion
Christopher Nolan is a well-known director behind the camera of numerous box-office hits. His “Dark Knight” trilogy, adaptations of the famous “Batman” comics, are among his most popular and lucrative productions. As of August 14, 2023, “Oppenheimer” was Christopher Nolan’s fourth highest grossing movie at the domestic box office, thus surpassing “Batman Begins”. “Oppenheimer” made it to the top ten highest grossing movie releases of 2023 with 80.5 million dollars at the North American box office over its opening weekend. Despite its length (just over three hours), more than a quarter of American movie goers went to see it on the big screen or were planning to do so.A Barbenheimer box office bonanza
While releasing two very different movies at the same time to drive a broad audience to the cinema (also called “counterprogramming”) is not exactly new, Barbenheimer defied expectations. Far from cannibalizing each other, both movies are seen as complementary to and inseparable from each other, thus boosting their ticket sales. As a result, both movies garnered a combined total of 235 million U.S. dollars. Less than one month after their releases, “Barbie” officially became “Barbillion” with a worldwide box office revenue of 1.18 billion U.S. dollars, while “Oppenheimer's" global box office results amounted to just under 650 million dollars.
