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In yesterday's daily box office analysis, I not-so-casually mentioned the arrival of a post-midnight release called Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. As we discussed yesterday, the movie got off to a relatively decent start, earning $12 million from midnight screenings, a total that would have been good enough to surpass Transformers as the number one movie for July 10th had it technically qualified. I also speculated that as much as a $50 million single day of box office could be possible. Despite the fact that there have been only three movies to ever perform this feat, the fifth Potter entry appeared poised to match it. As it turned out, reality set in just a bit, preventing Order of the Phoenix from quite reaching this landmark number. As it stands, Warner Bros. will have to settle for a measly $44,232,338, making it "only" the ninth largest box office day ever. Suffice it to say that Mr. Potter's new movie is doing okay.

How okay? Now is the time in the column wherein I recite stats to indicate what you already know: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is huge. Massive. Epic, in fact. But I must inform you of exactly how huge it is. Otherwise, I would not be arming you with the type of knowledge through which you may impress (okay, bore) friends and family members with your textbook recitations of obscure box office trivia. It's what we do, after all.

Here are the facts. In addition to having the most successful batch of midnight exhibitions ever with a $12 million gross, Order of the Phoenix has also become the largest Wednesday day of box office ever. This comes on the heels of Transformers becoming the largest Tuesday performer ever followed by the best July 4th holiday title to date. So, that is three daily records in the last eight days, which makes my job as a daily box office analyst much easier. Talking about records is always more fun than talking about what a disappointment Evan Almighty is.

In case you are wondering, the previous record for a Wednesday had been claimed by Spider-Man 2, which managed $40,442,604 on June 30, 2004. In case you are further wondering, in today's dollars Spider-Man 2's total would rise to $44.2 million, but if we are open up the can of worms of inflation adjustment, things get far too complicated for this discussion. Other, much older movies play into the discussion, and I'm unwilling to muddy the waters that much. Let's focus on actual dollars unless I specifically state otherwise, while giving Spidey fanboys their moment of happiness with the above news.

The first point I would like to make involves Order of the Phoenix's venue average of $10,579. I almost commented yesterday that the movie's $12 million from only 2,311 midnight exhibitions is the equivalent of a $15,578 weekend venue average. And that is just from the one batch of shows. Now consider that yesterday's venue average is the equivalent of $31,737 over a weekend and we have yet another "Yowza!" stat. Let's keep that thought process going by comparing the latest Potter release to the previous ones. I incidentally mentioned yesterday that Order of the Phoenix's sneaks made double what Goblet of Fire had managed. Let's now take a look at the individual daily numbers for each one.

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