Yes, But Does Narnia Have Legs?

Coming Soon reports on The Lion, the Witch and the Box Office:

Walt Disney Pictures’ The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe exceeded expectations, opening to an impressive $67.1 million. Director Andrew Adamson’s adaptation of the C.S. Lewis novel marks the second-biggest opening ever for a film in December, surpassing The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers ($62 million) and trailing only The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King ($72.6 million). It is also the 23rd best opening of all-time domestically and the third biggest debut of 2005 so far. The fantasy-adventure, budgeted at about $180 million, opened in 3,616 theaters and averaged $18,546 per location.

But will it last? Will people see it more than once in the theatre? That’s the test of a good adventure movie. Harry Potter kept its numbers high three weeks running, and remained at number one. Narnia‘s going to get buried by King Kong, but how will it compare to other films?

Is this important? Heck, yeah. It will determine just how much Disney invests in Prince Caspian and the rest of the series.