By CHRISTINA ALMEIDA, Associated Press Writer 2 hours, 9 minutes ago
LOS ANGELES - "X-Men: The Last Stand" stormed to an estimated $107 million three-day opening, the largest ever for Memorial Day weekend and the fourth-biggest in box office history.
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Preliminary estimates were released Sunday for the third installment of the series featuring a cast of mutants with names like Storm ( Halle Berry), Wolverine ( Hugh Jackman) and Mystique (Rebecca Romijn).
The 20th Century Fox film opened in 3,690 theaters and grossed a whopping $28,997 per theater.
"People had such a huge awareness of the movie that it just translated into these huge numbers," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations.
The film benefited from a huge base of fans who had seen the first two "X-Men" films, plus great marketing and solid reviews, Dergarabedian said.
"This is what the summer is all about," he said, adding the box office has rebounded well since last year's slump. "With `Da Vinci Code' doing better than anticipated ... we could not be in a better position."
Estimates for "The Da Vinci Code" over the start of the holiday weekend were not immediately available. That film, starring Tom Hanks and directed by Ron Howard, had a solid $77 million opener last weekend.
On the all-time list, "X-Men: The Last Stand" ranks behind only "Spider-Man," "Star Wars: Episode III" and "Shrek 2" for opening weekend gross. None of the other films opened on a holiday weekend, which usually gives movies a boost.
For Memorial Day openers, "X-Men" crushed the previous three-day high of $72 million, set by "The Lost World: Jurassic Park" in 1997.
Final box-office figures were expected Monday.
