Despite hybrid release, 'Dune' draws well on the big screen

NEW YORK (AP) — Denis Villeneuve's “Dune” debuted with $40.1 million in ticket sales in its opening weekend in North America, drawing a large number of moviegoers to see the thundering sci-fi epic on the big screen despite it also being available to stream in homes.

Warner Bros. launched the Legendary Entertainment production simultaneously in theaters and on HBO Max. When the studio first charted that course for all its 2021 releases due to the pandemic, how the strategy would affect “Dune” — one of the year's most anticipated spectacles — was always one of the biggest question marks. Villeneuve vehemently protested the decision.

“I strongly believe the future of cinema will be on the big screen, no matter what any Wall Street dilettante says,” Villeneuve wrote in a lengthy statement to Variety last December.

Warner Bros. has continued to maintain it will return to exclusive theatrical releases next year. For now, the $165 million-budgeted “Dune” marks the best domestic opening for any of the studio's hybrid releases, surpassing the $31.7 debut of “Godzilla vs. Kong" in March. Expectations had hovered closer to $30-35 million for “Dune.”

"This was a tremendous result as we're ramping out of the pandemic," said Jeff Goldstein, distribution chief for Warner Bros. “Once we get out of the pandemic, if we have a movie like this, clearly you'd want to go into theaters first. There's no question of that.”

Goldstein estimated the film would have debuted with approximately 20% more in box office had it not also been streaming simultaneously. (The studio didn't release streaming figures.) Coming into the weekend, “Dune,” which first premiered at the Venice Film Festival in early September, had already grossed $130 million internationally. This weekend, it debuted with $21.6...