Spidey swings back to action with $140m launch

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― Your new friendly neighborhood Spider-Man has spun himself a $65 million opening weekend and $140 million in his first six days at U.S. theaters.

Overseas, Sony’s “The Amazing Spider-Man” added $129.1 million, raising its international total to $201.6 million and worldwide haul to $341.2 million since it began rolling out a week earlier in some foreign markets.

The movie started off as a smaller domestic moneymaker than the previous three Spidey films, but it laid to rest objections that it was too soon to relaunch the superhero franchise.

The new origin story for the Marvel Comics web-slinger comes just five years after “Spider-Man 3,” Tobey Maguire and director Sam Raimi’s final movie in a series that shattered box-office records.

“This was never modeled or was never meant to be ‘Spider-Man 4.’ This was always a relaunch with a new cast and different stories to tell, and quite frankly, it succeeded beyond our imaginations,” said Rory Bruer, Sony’s head of distribution.

The previous weekend’s No. 1 film, Universal’s teddy-bear comedy “Ted,” fell to second-place with $32.6 million, raising its domestic total to $120.2 million.

Among new releases, Oliver Stone’s drug-war thriller “Savages” opened at No. 4 with a solid $16.2 million weekend, also for Universal. Paramount’s concert film “Katy Perry: Part of Me” failed to pack in the pop star’s fans, debuting at a distant No. 8 with just $7.2 million.