Weekly Rewind
July 8, 1998
In a summer full of blockbusters, Mel Gibson and Danny Glover reunited to bring Lethal Weapon 2 to the big screen with a number one debut nine years ago this week. Knocking Warner Bros. stablemate Batman from the top spot, the action sequel spent the first of three weeks as the nation's favorite movie giving its studio a lock on the box office crown for five straight weeks. Each of the top five movies that weekend grossed over $100M at the domestic box office that summer. Here are the top ten movies during the weekend of July 7 - 9, 1989:
| # | Title | July 7 - 9 | Jun 30 - Jul 2 | % Chg. | Screens | Weeks | AVG | Cumulative | Dist. |
| 1 | Lethal Weapon 2 | $ 20,388,800 | 1,803 | 1 | $ 11,308 | $ 20,388,800 | WB | ||
| 2 | Batman | 19,248,329 | 30,075,189 | -36.0 | 2,201 | 3 | 8,745 | 141,659,121 | WB |
| 3 | Honey, I Shrunk The Kids | 9,433,358 | 13,102,818 | -28.0 | 1,443 | 3 | 6,537 | 59,243,525 | BV |
| 4 | Ghostbusters II | 5,265,962 | 9,000,000 | -41.5 | 2,315 | 4 | 2,275 | 85,520,592 | Columbia |
| 5 | Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade | 5,205,338 | 7,088,465 | -26.6 | 1,917 | 7 | 2,715 | 158,469,476 | Paramount |
| 6 | Dead Poets Society | 5,186,264 | 6,708,768 | -22.7 | 1,109 | 6 | 4,677 | 56,765,388 | BV |
| 7 | The Karate Kid III | 4,905,961 | 10,400,000 | -52.8 | 1,560 | 2 | 3,145 | 21,614,898 | Columbia |
| 8 | Weekend at Bernie's | 4,506,086 | 1,134 | 1 | 3,974 | 6,410,073 | Fox | ||
| 9 | Do The Right Thing | 2,916,960 | 3,563,535 | -18.1 | 361 | 2 | 8,080 | 8,848,045 | Universal |
| 10 | Great Balls of Fire! | 2,161,404 | 3,807,986 | -43.2 | 1,417 | 2 | 1,525 | 8,446,281 | Orion |
| Top 5 | $ 59,541,787 | $ 69,666,472 | -14.5 | ||||||
| Top 10 | 79,218,462 | 88,019,691 | -10.0 |
Records were falling left and right that summer. Harrison Ford blew open the season with the $37M Memorial Day weekend debut of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade breaking the record for that holiday weekend set in 1984 by the previous installment of the trilogy Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Three weeks later, Ghostbusters II broke the record for the biggest three-day opening ever with $29.5M. Bill Murray and company enjoyed the glory for just one week as the Caped Crusader swooped into theaters the next weekend and grossed an unheardof $42.7M (including Thursday night previews). The crushing debut of Batman left a seemingly endless amount of sold out shows and long lines in its wake. No film would come close to beating Batman's opening weekend record for three years until Michael Keaton slipped on the Batsuit for a second and final time in Batman Returns which opened with $45.7M in June 1992.
The summer of 1989 was overflowing with recycled material as eight sequels were released along with the latest James Bond film License to Kill. Three pictures in the top ten (Batman, Honey, I Shrunk The Kids, and Weekend at Bernie's) would spawn sequels of their own. The summer also saw three films reach the $90-100M range as Dead Poets Society grossed $95M, When Harry Met Sally reached $92M, and Parenthood collected $96M. Today, distributors tend to push these movies, in any way they can, over the prestigious $100M mark. Since the summer of 1989, 9 films have finished with grosses of $90-100M while 28 have grossed between $100-110M.
One of the most successful smaller pics of the season was Spike Lee's Do The Right Thing which expanded to only 534 screens but grossed an impressive $26M. Today it stands as the director's third highest-grossing film, after Malcolm X ($48M) and Jungle Fever ($32M), and his most critically-acclaimed. Other notable releases during the summer of 1989 included Star Trek V ($52M domestic gross), Turner & Hooch ($70M), Uncle Buck ($64M), The Abyss ($54M), and Cannes champ sex, lies, and videotape ($25M).
Written by Gitesh Pandya