Kung Fu Panda 3 kicked its way to the top of the North American box office over the weekend, bouncing The Revenant to the number two spot, industry estimates showed Sunday.
Advertisement
Prospects are bright for China, given its status as a local co-production, which means it’s not part of the 34-title annual quota for US films.
Back in 2010, DreamWorks CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg revealed there are six chapters in the Kung Fu Panda movie series.
The voice cast of Kung Fu Panda 3 sees the return of franchise stars Jack Black, Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman, Lucy Liu, Jackie Chan and Seth Rogen, while Jennifer Yuh Nelson (Kung Fu Panda 2) shares directing duties with Alessandro Carloni. The new film easily won the weekend, while other new releases were buried behind holdovers. The film also had a strong opening in Korea, where it debuted on 1,300-plus screens and took $11.4 million, $380,000 of which was from the 17 participating IMAX theaters. Disney’s The Finest Hours faced rough waters, debuting to only $10.3 million in 3,143 locations.
The largest animated opening ever in China was “Minions”, which earned Comcast Corp.-owned CMCSA, +2.96% Universal $31.3 million, and went on to gross $68.5 million in China, according to data from Box Office Mojo. The Chris Pine-starring disaster-at-sea pic only made $10.3 million. The Illumination Ent. film went on to earn $68.5 million in China.
Marlon Wayans’ spoof of E.L. James’ Fifty Shades of Grey opened to $6.2 million in 2,982 locations, earning a C CinemaScore.
“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” is still bringing audiences to the theater.
Advertisement
Oscar-hopeful “The Revenant”, distributed by Fox, and Disney’s record-breaking “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” continued their solid performances, holding on to No. 2 and No. 3 slot. That film opened in May that year, rather than January. Newcomer “The Finest Hours” enters the chart at No. 4 with an estimated $10.3 million, while “Ride Along 2” rounds out the top five with approximately $8.3 million.
