Alejandro Gonzelez Inarritu's "Birdman" is not only the top contender to take home the Best Picture Oscar this Feb. 22, but it is officially the Mexican director's top grossing film of all time. After it took home a solid $1.3 million this weekend, the film surpassed 2006's "Babel" to take sole possession as his most profitable film domestically.

The film is now north of $35 million, a moderate success when compared to how his compatriots Guillermo del Toro and Alfonso Cuaron, who have admittedly made far more gargantuan films, have done on their own major projects. But it does represent a huge success for a filmmaker that despite a small output thus far, is showing signs of reaching the public with each effort.

And "Birdman" has reached that status with a shorter theatrical run than two of the auteur's previous films. "Babel" was in theaters for 154 days from October 2006 through the end of March 2007. The 2011 film "Biutiful" was in theaters for 133 days between January and June 2011. "Birdman" made its theatrical bow in late October and is still in theaters. There is a chance that the film could wind up playing longer than "Babel," especially if it manages to produce a Best Picture win at the Oscars in two weeks.

No one should mistake Inarritu as a box office king -- at least not at this point. There is certainly a upward trend in terms of the gross his films bring in over the last 13 years, but five films is a rather small sample size. And his next film, "The Revenant," includes enough A-list talent to potentially go on a huge box office run. 

His first film, "Amore Perros," was actually a terrific success with a lifetime domestic gross of $5.4 million. It managed to get into 187 theaters at the peak of its run. The low-budget hyperlink film is not even the lowest grossing of the director's features. That honor actually falls to "Biutiful," the Javier Bardem-starrer that notched the actor a Best Actor nomination at the Oscars a few years ago. That film still made a solid $5.1 million and screened at 191 theaters throughout its run.

His second feature, "21 Grams," made more money than either of those two films, with a box office intake of $16.2 million throughout its run. But the film was actually a flop as it cost $20 million to make and featured such actors as Naomi Watts and Benicio del Toro, who also notched an Oscar nominations for Best Supporting actor categories. That film screened at 411 theaters throughout its run.

And then come "Babel" and "Birdman," which are millions ahead of the pack. To this point, "Birdman" has screened at far fewer theaters than "Babel;" the former has been exhibited at 976 theaters while the latter was shown at 1,251. Theater counts have increased for "Birdman" over the last three weeks and it is possible that the film could surpass its predecessor. On Jan 16,the film was expanded into 243 theater while a week later 362 theaters were added. This past week, the film was placed into 143 more theaters. The two previous increases in theater count unsurprisingly led to gross increases of 132% in the first weekend of expansion and another 19.9 percent growth in the second weekend of expansion on Jan. 23. This past increase however has seen the growth of the gross drop by 22.5 percent over the previous week.

After winning the Golden Globe for Best Drama on Jan. 15, "Babel" saw a tremendous expansion the following week into 716 theaters. This increase, followed by another 201 theater expansion the following week, helped the film boost its gross by $6.4 million or 18.6 percent of its overall domestic gross. Distributor Paramount Vantage then stopped expanding the film after its 14th week ("Birdman" is in its 16th) and saw tremendous diminishing returns thereafter from weeks 15-22. The film wound up making close to $4 million more in those remaining seven weeks, an average of $571,428 per week.

"Birdman" could be undergoing its big diminishing returns. Most films peak on their box office intake in the first week of wide expansion (more than 600 theaters). That happened for "Babel" during its third weekend when it was thrust in 1,216 more theaters and made a whopping $7.2 million. "Birdman" had to wait until its fifth weekend to see wide release, but the results were far from complimentary. Up to that point it had been making a consistent $3 million in each of its previous weekends in almost half the number of theaters. And why wouldn't it? Press was great as was word-of-mouth. But with the wide expansion, the film only saw a miniscule increase in its weekly gross by $200,000. For some context, the film averaged $3,999 per theater in its first weekend of wide expansion; a week earlier it averaged $7,259 per theater in a little under half as many cinemas.

The most recent expansion into 362 theaters on Jan. 23 should have shown a greater intake, especially with the film being positioned as an awards front-runner, but the film managed $2.7 million throughout the week, an indication that its best days are behind it and that the decline will continue throughout the coming weeks.

But what if it wins the Best Picture Oscar?

Last year's winner, "12 Years A Slave," saw an expansion into over 700 more theaters over the ensuing two weeks and saw slight increase in its gross after winning the big award. The film added roughly $7 million to its eventual $56 million gross, or 12.5 percent.

"Argo" saw a slight expansion after winning the Oscar in early March, but was unable to regain any momentum in its box office gross afterward. In total it made a little under $3 million after winning the award, approximately 2 percent of its overall gross of $136 million. Part of that had to do with the fact that its DVD was already on the market by the time it won the Oscar.

In 2012, "The Artist" saw a wider expansion after its Oscar victory and reaped great benefits with over $11 million in gross in the weeks following the Oscar win. But that film benefitted from winning its Oscar just 14 weeks into its run. "Argo" was in its 21st week when it won the Best Picture award and "12 Years a Slave" was in its 20th. If "Birdman" wins the Oscar next week, it would be in its 18st week, so the scenario is a little more muddled and unpredictable.

"The King's Speech" was also in its 14th week when it pulled off its Oscar win and managed a whopping $18 million in the ensuing four weeks that it remained in theaters (13 percent of its overall gross). The film of course was still averaging over $10 million per week over the three weeks leading up to the Oscar, thanks to some high profile awards wins and its strong presence with audiences. "Birdman" has never come close to a gross that high per week and the chances of that suddenly changing are minimal to none.

But there is absolutely no chance "Birdman" endures the fate of the 2009 winner "The Hurt Locker," which is the lowest grossing best picture of all time with an intake just south of $16 million. That film however was released in the summer and ended its run in mid-November. However it was re-released for two weeks after winning the Oscar and managed to bring in $1.7 million (a little over 10 percent of its growth).

So where should "Birdman" expect to finish its run when all is said and done? If it wins Best Picture (and it has a huge chance of that after winning three of the four guilds so far; a win with the Writer's Guild would all but secure victory), then there should be at least a few million more for the film's overall box office. That said, the film's box office intake will struggle with a forthcoming DVD release, something that some of the other films did not have to deal with ("The Artist's" home video release came in late June, 31 weeks after it had been released in theaters for the first time). As was the case with "Argo" and the "Hurt Locker," competing with the DVD did not help. But those films did see continued growth and even the smallest of spikes in the weeks following Oscar glory.

So it might not be unreasonable to predict somewhere between the $40 to $45 million mark if the film holds steady and gets a nudge from winning the Oscars. Otherwise, it is likely to cap off around or just above the $40 million mark.