Warner Bros. predicts up to $220 million in first week!

Should Heath get an Oscar for his role as the Joker?

The much-anticipated superhero thriller 'The Dark Knight' broke the weekend opening record by earning $158.4 million, shattering the previous record set last year by 'Spider-Man 3,' Warner Bros. estimates showed.

Speaking about the record-breaking opening, Christian Bale told Britain's GMTV such amounts of money are hard to fathom. "It's Monopoly money to me – I can't even comprehend it." The star said studio financial expectations don't really affect him before his movies come out. "I always actually approach every movie as though no one is ever going to see it," he told GMTV.

'The Dark Knight' started off on Friday by setting a one-day box office record, taking in $66.4 million its opening day, according to distributor Warner Bros.

The movie beat out 'Spider-Man 3,' which earned $151.1 million during its weekend opening in May 2007, as well the two last 'Pirates of the Caribbean' films, 'Shrek the Third,' 'Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith' and the 'Harry Potter' series.

Warner Bros' latest take on Batman, with a budget of $180 million, stars Bale as billionaire Bruce Wayne, whose alter ego attempts to protect Gotham City from a host of pesky villains. This time around, Batman, who gets romantic with a sexy crusader named Rachel Dawes, (Maggie Gyllenhaal), raises the stakes in his war on crime.

He also teams up with Lt. James Gordon (Gary Oldman) and Gotham's new District Attorney, Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), to take on a psychotic bank robber known as The Joker (Heath Ledger). While other forces plot against the group, the Joker's crimes grow even deadlier.

Fellow cast members have lauded Ledger's dark portrayal of evil -- a dramatic contrast from the actor's own persona -- and prompted many in the industry to predict the role will earn the late actor an Academy Award.

Warner Bros. is now predicting 'The Dark Knight' could gross as much as $220 million its first week. The studio reported that audience demographics for the film were ideally broad, with males representing 52 percent of patrons and ticket-buyers evenly split between those under 25 and older moviegoers.