Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is only the second Harry Potter film to open on a Wednesday, after 2007's Order of the Phoenix. By the Sunday of its opening weekend, Order of the Phoenix was looking at a pretty impressive $140 million, on its way to being the year's 5th highest grosser, and a solid #2 in the franchise. By the Sunday of its opening weekend, Half-Blood Prince has $160 million in its coffers, as well as a slew of rapturous reviews and positive fan responses. (Well, mostly. There will always be whining from Rowling purists who don't know what an adaptation is.)

That raises a real possibility that Half-Blood Prince could dethrone current domestic franchise king Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, which holds the top spot with $317 million. At the very least, it looks like it might be the only movie other than Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen to break the $300 million mark in 2009. (Transformers itself is already at $363 million -- #13 of all time! Christ!* -- and is looking unbeatable.)

Brüno took the tumble that its front-loaded opening weekend suggested (it made more than half its first weekend gross on the Friday of its release), dropping over 70% to fourth place. It will end up with around half of Borat's $129 million final number. The other summer comedies in circulation, The Hangover and The Proposal continue to hold up very well, with the former boosting from #6 to #5 in its seventh week of release.

(500) Days of Summer, opening on 27 screens in advance of a steady expansion in the coming weeks, got off to a promising 12th place start with a per-screen average over $30K.

The full top 12 after the jump.

1 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Warner Bros.) - $79.48 ($18,376) - $159.66
2 - Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (Fox) - $17.70 ($4,637) - $152.01
3 - Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Paramount/Dreamworks) - $13.75 ($3,565) - $363.87
4 - Brüno (Universal) - $8.37 ($3,035) - $49.59
5 - The Hangover (Warner Bros.) - $8.32 ($3,118) - $235.88
6 - The Proposal (Disney) - $8,29 ($2,726) - $128.09
7 - Public Enemies (Universal) - $7.59 ($3,435) - $79.48
8 - Up (Disney) - $3.15 ($1,845) - $279.56
9 - My Sister's Keeper (Warner Bros.) - $2.83 ($1,436) - $41.50
10 - I Love You, Beth Cooper (Fox) - $2.67 ($1,424) - $10.26
11 - The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (Sony) - $0.89 ($1,451) - $62.90
12 - (500) Days of Summer (Fox Searchlight) - $0.84 ($31,937) - $0.84

Next week: the military-gerbil comedy G-Force, the apparently-terrible The Ugly Truth, and the apparently-not-bad Orphan. In other words, another weekend atop the pack for The Half-Blood Prince.

This post's somewhat weird title comes from a tweet by Cinematical overlord Erik Davis, who recently remarked that no one in the Harry Potter films or novels has ever delivered that line, and that someone really should before it's too late.

*Currently #12 but hanging there by a thread.