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“The Lion King” Dominates US Friday Box Office, Heads For July Opening Weekend Record

“The Lion King” is pacing for a mammoth opening weekend.

Based on its strong opening day performance, Disney’s remake of “The Lion King” should set the all-time opening weekend record for July.

The film amassed an impressive $78.5 million on Friday (with Thursday previews included). Easily enough for #1 on the Friday leaderboard, the figure positions “The Lion King” to close the weekend in the $185-205 million range.

Anything in that range would rank as the best ever for a July release; current record-holder “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2” debuted with $169.2 million.

It would also represent one of the ten biggest opening weekends in any month. “Captain America: Civil War,” which currently holds the #10 spot, earned $179.1 million in its first outing.

— Other Top 5 performers on Friday included “Spider-Man: Far From Home” ($6.0 million, #2), “Toy Story 4” ($4.4 million, #3), “Crawl” ($1.7 million, #4) and “Yesterday” ($1.4 million, #5).

Brian Cantor

Brian Cantor is the editor-in-chief for Headline Planet. He has been a leading reporter in the music, movie, television and sporting spaces since 2002. Brian's reporting has been cited by major websites like BuzzFeed, Billboard, the New Yorker and The Fader -- and shared by celebrities like Taylor Swift, Justin Bieber and Nicki Minaj. Contact Brian at brian.cantor[at]headlineplanet.com.

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