worried that the film was not funny enough. Hill and his co-screenwriter, Larry Gross wrote more material tailored to Nolte's and Murphy's personalities. By Hill's account, they rewrote Murphy's character right to the very last day of shooting. Executives also found the footage of the gunfight in the hotel to be too violent and were worried that it would kill the film's humor. They told Hill that he would never work for Paramount again as a result. Actor Chris Mulkey, said it was widely known on set that Paramount executives hated what they had seen of Murphy's performance in dailies and wanted to fire him, but Nolte and Hill fought to keep him. Mulkey remembered Murphy as a diligent performer who was open to suggestion and stuck to the script. In 2008, co-writer Larry Gross's contemporaneous diary of his days on set was published on the MovieCityNews website. Music In January 2011, Intrada Records released the world-premiere recording of James Horner's score and songs from the movie in a limited-edition run of 5,000 units. This was the first official release of the score; previous pressings from Europe were unofficial bootlegs with music from other James Horner film scores. Reception Box office 48 Hrs. opened in the United States on Wednesday, December 8, 1982, with its first weekend the same as The Toy and Airplane II: The Sequel and finished behind them in third place for the weekend with a gross of $4,369,868 from 850 screens, and had a gross of $5,273,192 from its first 5 days. The film grossed $78,868,508 overall at the U.S. and Canada box office, surpassing their combined box-office, to become the seventh highest-grossing film of 1982. Critical response 48 Hrs. received critical acclaim and is considered by many as one of the best films of 1982. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a 94% approval rating, based on 47 reviews, with an average rating of 7.3/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Marking an auspicious feature film debut for Eddie Murphy, 48 Hrs. is a briskly paced action comedy that succeeds largely due to the outstanding chemistry between its two leads". On Metacritic, the film has a score of 71 out of 100, based on 8 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". In 2007, the staff at IGN named the movie the third-greatest buddy cop film. Awards and nominations Sequel and remakes A sequel, Another 48 Hrs., was