Order up some more therapy sessions for leading man Chris Evans, for his ultimate nightmare has come true; that is, Captain America: The First Avenger has scored an estimated $65.8 million opening weekend and is, therefore, well is on the way to becoming a raging success. So unless the international box office falls through (and it may very well do so; for, as a precautionary measure, Paramount has preemptively retitled the pic as The First Avenger in overseas markets) it looks like there will be probably be a sequel on the way in addition to The Avengers, which is currently filming. Naturally, Chris Evans has not yet accepted the truth of the matter, for he has told Us Weekly that he doesn’t feel like a sex symbol at all because of two reasons: (1) He’s “drowning” in “raging insecurity”; and (2) In his view, fellow Avengers Chris Hemsworth and Robert Downey Jr. are far sexier with the latter in particular being “so experienced.” In related news, Jude Law called, and he’s not at all happy that anyone is macking upon his homoerotic Sherlock Holmes chemistry with RDJ.

Also not helping matters in any department are those waxed-up nipples, which (oddly enough) stand a good chance of besting Thor‘s mighty abdominal muscles:

Paramount’s figure would better this summer’s original superhero Thor‘s $65.7M. But I believe we’ll have to wait until Monday’s actuals to decide who is the biggest superhero of the summer since Sunday’s number is just an estimate right now. As a Paramount exec replied to my questioning his number, “Harry Potter fell 16$ last Sunday. We are estimating down 17$. Whether it ends up $65.8M or a little less, it crushed Green Lantern and X-Men: First Class” — both of which were this summer’s superhero movies but made and distributed by different studios (Warner Bros and Fox respectively). Saturday’s take for Captain America of $21.9M was -10% from Friday’s $25.7M North American grosses from 3,715 theaters including around 2,500 showing the movie in 3D. Friday’s take includes $4M midnights from 2,000 locations, better than Thor and Green Lantern as well as prequel/reboot X-Men: First Class. The movie earned an ‘A-’ CinemaScore. (Thor earned a B+). Exit polls showed 43% of the audience was under age 25 vs 57% over age 25 while 64% were male vs 36% female. (Thor was 62% male & 28% under 25.)

From the start, the studio gave a cool retro feel to this World War II actioner about Steve Rogers who transforms from a proverbial 90lb weakling into 6-pack-abs Evans who’s not only easy on the eyes but can act like more than just a pumped-up uber-soldier. “Captain America is the ultimate underdog story,” one of the execs involved told me about positioning. “A physically weak man, who has infinite courage and drive, is transformed into the world’s first avenger.” And there are Nazis to vanquish as well. Cooler still.

Websites that do geek (I don’t) claim Captain America is the more mainstream superhero to make a big screen debut this summer, compared with Thor and Green Lantern. But that duo had far less competition when they opened, and certainly nothing like the Harry Potter finale in theaters. Intro-ing any new superhero is a bitch, but Marvel bitchslaps the competition again and again by doing it deftly. As far back as last October, Captain America was revealed on the cover of EW last year. Chris Evans presented with Thor‘s Chris Hemsworth at last January’s Golden Globes. The Superbowl spot was Twitter’s most talked about movie ad from the game. There was the usual heavy rotation of TV ads for the network season finales and sports playoffs and music shows. To make inroads with flyover country, the campaign made a big deal of the CMA Music Festival which features 750K attendees; 30 country radio stations sponsored fly-ins to celebrate Captain America Night on June 10th. Also to that end, the campaign did military outreach: the film was screened first on 30 U.S. military bases. I always thought that Captain America would attract a lot of patriotic fever because of its “Heroes are made in America” tagline.

[From Deadline]

Meanwhile, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 fell to second place with $48.1 million but still boasts an incredibly impressive $274.2 million domestic total after two weekends, plus it broke all those records last weekend in addition to leaving an incredible literary and cinematic legacy in its wake. I predict that no other future franchise will enjoy such an enduring record of success.

Further down the line, the latest R-rated romcom, Friends with Benefits, earned a lukewarm $18.5 million, meaning that it’s not exactly a disappointment in Hollywood terms and may just earn Mila Kunis some other leading lady roles that are long overdue. Still, I do believe that the picture would have earned at least an extra million if Mila Kunis had not used a butt double. All I’m really saying is that, sure, I’d totally have paid to see Mila’s actual, authentic butt. As far as Justin Timberlake’s butt is concerned, uh, no thanks.

Coming in at fourth and fifth place, respectively speaking, were Transformers: Dark of the Moon with $12 million and Horrible Bosses with $11.7 million. The latter has also accrued an inexplicable $82.4 million domestically. In other words, there will be many more Jennifer Aniston movies. Don’t kill the messenger.

Movie stills courtesy of AllMoviePhoto

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