‘Dune: Part Three’ Is Already Breaking IMAX Records Months Before It Even Opens

Denis Villeneuve’s ‘Dune‘ trilogy has spent years building one of the most reliable box office franchises in modern sci-fi, and its concluding chapter is shaping up to be no exception. With ‘Dune: Part Three’ still months away from its theatrical release, early indicators are already pointing toward one of the biggest openings the series has ever seen.

That momentum has been building steadily since presale tickets first went live earlier this year. When premium-format seats for the film went on sale in April, the entire allotment of IMAX 70mm screenings across just 11 U.S. cities sold out within minutes, a pattern that repeated itself when a second wave of presales opened in August and crashed theater websites in the process.

Now, tracking suggests ‘Dune: Part Three’ is heading toward a global opening north of $200 million, with the film reportedly becoming the fastest release to sell out BFI IMAX screenings in London, surpassing even the record recently set by Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Odyssey.’ If those numbers hold, it would mark the biggest opening of Timothée Chalamet’s career to date.

That would be a significant leap for the franchise. ‘Dune: Part Two’ opened domestically to $81.5 million back in 2024 before going on to gross more than $714 million worldwide, with IMAX screenings alone contributing a massive share of its total haul. A $200 million global debut for the third film would represent a substantial jump beyond even that strong prior performance.

Much of that anticipation has been fueled by the format itself. ‘Dune: Part Three’ is the second film ever, after ‘The Odyssey,’ to be shot partially using IMAX’s newest generation of film cameras, and it’s expected to present much of its runtime in the full IMAX 1.43:1 aspect ratio, the same immersive format that helped turn Nolan’s film into a genuine IMAX phenomenon earlier this year.

That comparison to ‘The Odyssey’ isn’t incidental, either. Nolan’s film became the highest-grossing movie in IMAX history, pulling in more than $364 million in IMAX ticket sales alone, and industry analysts have pointed to a likely “halo effect” carrying over into ‘Dune’s’ own premium-format demand heading into December.

Adding to the pressure is the timing of the release itself. ‘Dune: Part Three’ is set to open on December 18, the very same day as Marvel’s ‘Avengers: Doomsday,’ setting up a direct box office showdown between two of the year’s biggest tentpole releases. Some industry analysts have suggested Warner Bros. could have benefited from opening the film slightly earlier to avoid that head-to-head competition, though the studio has stuck with its December date.

Despite the looming Marvel clash, the sheer scale of ‘Dune: Part Three’s’ cast has kept expectations high. The film reunites Chalamet and Zendaya alongside Jason Momoa, Florence Pugh, Rebecca Ferguson, Josh Brolin, Javier Bardem, and Robert Pattinson in a new villain role, adapting Frank Herbert’s ‘Dune Messiah’ to close out Villeneuve’s trilogy.

For Chalamet specifically, a $200 million-plus global opening would cap off a rapid ascent from art-house darling to full-fledged blockbuster lead, a trajectory that’s been building steadily since the first ‘Dune’ film’s theatrical release back in 2021. Whether the finished film can match the box office momentum its presales have already generated remains to be seen, but with premium screenings selling out months in advance, audiences clearly aren’t waiting to make up their minds.

With Marvel and Warner Bros. gearing up for a genuine holiday box office battle, December is shaping up to be one of the most competitive theatrical windows in recent memory.

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