2023 marked a transformative period in the worldwide cinema landscape. The consistent success of established franchises such as Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe, Universal’s Fast series, and Paramount’s Mission: Impossible movies was was balanced by the dominance of new entertainment IPs like Warner Bros.’ Barbie and Universal’s Super Mario Bros. One of the highlights of the year unfolded with Universal’s unveiling of Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, amassing an astonishing $950 million globally.
The following are the top box office moneymakers of 2013.
- Fast X
Domestic Aggregate (2023): $145.9M
International Aggregate (2023): $558.7M
Global Aggregate (2023): $704.7M
The tenth installment in the Fast & Furious saga continues the franchise’s pattern of global triumph, attaining 79.3% of its overall earnings abroad. Despite the movie not achieving as much success at the box office overall compared to its forerunner F9 ($726.2M worldwide), it did exceed the prior film’s international revenue by more than 3%.
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
Domestic Aggregate (2023): $358.9M
International Aggregate (2023): $486.5M
Global Aggregate (2023): $845.5M
The final installment of James Gunn’s trilogy emerged as the Marvel box office highlight of 2023, yielding nearly $225M more internationally than Marvel Studios’ Q1 release, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, which totaled $261.5M internationally and $476M globally (and ranked tenth for the year). The third chapter of the rag-tag Guardians ensemble amassed more overseas than its predecessor Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 ($473.9M), and fell just over 18M short of the second chapter’s global take.
- Oppenheimer
Domestic Aggregate (2023): $326M
International Aggregate (2023): $625.2M
Global Aggregate (2023): $952M
Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer claimed the third spot on the global list and fifth domestically. Globally, Nolan’s latest garnered just under a billion dollars—a significant achievement for a three-hour, dialogue-laden biographical film grounded in a historical figure. Oppenheimer drew 65.7% of its global revenue from international markets, with the U.K. ($74.2M), China ($61.6M), Germany ($51.4M), France ($42.5M), and Italy ($29.8M) ranking as the movie’s top five non-domestic markets.
Globally and domestically, premium formats played a crucial role in propelling Oppenheimer’s success; Imax indicates that the film stood as its highest global earner of the year, with its $185M cumulative in the format significantly contributing to propelling Imax to achieve only the third $1B year in the company’s history. Oppenheimer’s $35M inaugural weekend earnings on 740 IMAX screens worldwide represents IMAX’s most substantial share ever of a film’s global opening weekend box office, constituting 20% of total receipts.
- The Super Mario Bros. Movie
Domestic Total (2023): $574.9M
International Total (2023): $787M
Global Total (2023): $1.36 billion
The Super Mario Bros. is the second-highest-grossing film of 2023 on both the domestic and international charts, with the animated video game adaptation outperforming Barbie in several key international markets, including Mexico, France (where it ranked second, behind the December 2022 release Avatar: The Way of Water, and Japan—where it became the biggest Universal animation release of all time. Other records include the biggest global opening for an animated film of all time (Mario’s $375.6M surpassing Frozen 2’s $358M), the biggest opening for animation studio Illumination of all time (no small feat, given the worldwide popularity of the Minions franchise), and the biggest opening of all time for a video game adaptation. In its first weekend alone–the weekend ending April 9, when it was released in North America and 70 international markets—the film’s international haul passed the total international grosses of several recent animated titles, including Encanto, Lightyear, and DC League of Super-Pets.
- Barbie
Warner Bros. | July 21
Domestic Total (2023): $636.2M
International Total (2023): $805.6M
Global Total (2023): $1.4 Billion
It appears that the whole world adored Barbie in 2023, as the Warner Bros. release secured the leading position on year-end rankings in the U.K., Argentina, Spain, Italy, Poland, Australia, and Brazil. Barbie’s box office run established it as Warner Bros.’ most lucrative film of all time globally and the third highest-earning both in the combined international markets and specifically in European markets. Moreover, it clinched the top spot as the highest-grossing Warner Bros. title in a staggering 44 international markets, encompassing the U.K., Italy, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, Argentina, and Poland. Barbie claims the 14th position on the Top Lifetime Grosses Worldwide list.