Warner Bros’ “Wonder Woman” and director Patty Jenkins have been the toast of the summer box office so far. Now it has added a new record to its list of achievements, becoming the highest grossing live-action film directed by a woman.
On Sunday, the film added a $25 million fourth weekend to bring its domestic total to $318 million. Combined with its $334.5 million overseas cume, it has passed the $609 million set by Phyllida Lloyd’s “Mamma Mia!” in 2008. The highest grossing female-directed film of all-time, regardless of medium is Jennifer Lee’s “Frozen,” which grossed $1.27 billion.
Not only is Jenkins’ film about to break that record; but it is also on pace to outperform its DC Extended Universe brethren, “Suicide Squad” and “Batman v Superman” with its domestic numbers by the end of this coming week.
“Wonder Woman” had a noticeably lower opening weekend than those two films, grossing $103 million to “Squad”‘s $133 million and “BvS”‘s $166 million. But thanks to its near-unanimous praise from critics and incredibly strong word of mouth, it has been steadily bridging the gap with strong holdover totals. In its third weekend, “WW” posted an incredible $40 million in its third weekend, double that of “Suicide Squad” and drastically higher than the $23 million posted by “BvS.”
With this $25 million fourth frame, nearly triple the amount “BvS” made in April 2016, “WW” is just $12 million away from passing last year’s clash between the Dark Knight and the Man of Steel. Once it passes “Batman v Superman,” “Wonder Woman” will rank third amongst all DC films at the domestic box office behind only “The Dark Knight” ($534 million) and “The Dark Knight Rises” ($448.5 million).