Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Is Now Tim Burton's Highest Grossing Movie in Over Ten Years

The movie is just a hair behind Batman at the all-time box office.

By Russ Burlingame

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice continues to perform at the box office, and is currently the third-highest-grossing movie ever directed by Tim Burton. It's likely that by tonight or tomorrow, it will actually take the #2 spot, as the movie sits at $250.13 million -- just a hair below Batman's $251.18 million. The only movie ahead of those is Burton's Alice in Wonderland remake, which earned $334 million domestically. The breakdown is a little -- but not too much -- different at the global box office, where Alice is followed by Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Batman, and Beetlejuice Beetlejuice.

The Beetlejuice sequel was also the second-highest opening of Burton's career, after Alice in Wonderland, which bowed at $116 million. It also opened to the third-highest opening weekend of the year, behind Deadpool & Wolverine and Inside Out 2.

The international numbers are indicative of how much more of a factor international audiences have become for Hollywood blockbusters in the 21st century: globally, Alice in Wonderland has earned over $1 billion, with $691 million coming from the international box office. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory sneaks in ahead of Batman globally because it earned $269 million internationally, pushing it over $450 million globally. So far, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice has made most of its money in North America, with just $123 million coming from the international box office.

Beetlejuice, made for a reported $15 million budget, made that much in just three weeks back in 2013 on DVD, according to The Numbers. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice cost more like $100 million to make -- suggesting a high degree of confidence in the sequel by Warner Bros.

Of course, Disney got bit by that kind of thing last year, when they spent somewhere between $295 million and $387 million to make an Indiana Jones movie that ended up earning just $384 million at the box office. When you account for marketing, that means the movie would have had to make around $600 million to break even -- something that none of the four previous Indiana Jones movies had come remotely close to doing. In this case, that number would be closer to $250 million...which Beetlejuice Beetlejuice has managed in North America alone.

Here's the official synopsis for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice:

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"Beetlejuice is back! After an unexpected family tragedy, three generations of the Deetz family return home to Winter River. Still haunted by Beetlejuice, Lydia's life is turned upside down when her rebellious teenage daughter, Astrid, discovers the mysterious model of the town in the attic, and the portal to the Afterlife is accidentally opened. With trouble brewing in both realms, it's only a matter of time until someone says Beetlejuice's name three times and the mischievous demon returns to unleash his very own brand of mayhem." 

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is in theaters now.

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