The French can now regard to Steven Spielberg as an ‘officer in the French Legion of Honour.’ The most famous director in the world got this honor Wednesday, for his documentation on WWII and his help in Darfur. It’s the highest award you can get in France and of course president Nicolas Sarkozy was the one to give it to him.

I wonder how much of these buttons Spielberg has now. It’s not like he isn’t busy enough with that little movie called ‘The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ these days. But it’s always difficult to cancel a meeting with some president in a palace I suppose. Well, back to promoting Indy 4. We all know it has to make at least $400 million.

Paramount Pictures International will begin to roll out ‘Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ worldwide today. The movie is having its premiere in France, Belgium and Switzerland today, with the rest of the world following during the weekend. Dr. Henry Jones is only skipping Japan, but Paramount did the same with ‘Iron Man’ last month. Although ‘Iron Man’ will be released in Japan at the end of September, while ‘Indiana Jones 4′ will be there next month.

Paramount will ship an impressive 12,000 prints of the movie into 60 markets, with Germany and the UK both getting more than 1,000 prints. In the US, about 4,000 theaters are showing Spielberg’s blockbuster during the Memorial Day weekend. And as you would expect, there’s not much else releasing this weekend. No studio dared to put anything up to the most anticipated movie of the last years. Or should I say no studio was stupid enough? But will Indy beat ‘Spider-man 3′?

That’s the big question. Will ‘Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ do an ‘Iron Man’ or ‘Prince Caspian’ weekend. The last one, ‘The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian,’ had much lower opening than what initial tracking indicated. ‘Iron Man’ however, surprised the industry by breaking $100 million in the US during the first couple of days.

Tracking numbers for ‘Indiana Jones 4′ are good, but will it be able to top the opening of ‘Spider-man 3′ last year? The comic book hero made over $151 million in its first weekend, beating the $136 million opening by ‘Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest’ in 2006.

The first two ‘Indiana Jones’ movies didn’t even cross the $200 million bar domestically during their total running time. But the first ‘Indiana Jones’ only cost $28 million and the second $48 million. The new ‘Indiana Jones’ movie is rumored to cost anywhere between $125 and $200 million to produce. Including marketing and distribution, the movie has to make $400 million before Harrison, Spielberg and Lucas will get paid.