'American Sniper' Is Breaking Records Already

Bradley Cooper is officially having the best weekend ever. He's barely even had time to settle down from the excitement of making history as the first actor in 13 years to pick up three back-to-back Oscar nods, and now the 40-year-old star already has another huge success to celebrate: The Wrap reports that Cooper's latest film, American Sniper, earned $30 million at the box office on Friday, which was the first day of its wide release and officially January's biggest single-day in history.

As if that wasn't a huge enough feat, the movie's projected to make $80 million over the four-day Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend, at which point it will surpass last year's Ice Cube and Kevin Hart comedy Ride Along as January's best three-day opener of all time. Not bad at all is a huge understatement.

While those numbers are obviously something to be marveled at, surely everyone saw these insane first day, wide release ticket sales coming from a mile away, particularly because the the Clint Eastwood-directed war drama's already set such an impressive precedent: Three weeks ago, American Sniper broke a limited release record when it earned $850,000 during its first four days of release, and that was with the movie only showing in four theaters. Four!

And for anyone who's been in full-fledged hermit mode and missed the Oscar nominations: American Sniper is also up for six Oscars, including nominations for Best Picture, Actor and Adapted Screenplay.

Clearly, American Sniper has hit the ground running, and with the multiple Oscar nods and continuous record-breaking numbers, it's safe to assume that the film's frenzied pace will only grow faster in the coming weeks.