Box Office, Weekend Box Office | featured news

The finale of Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy took in about $162 million in North America, less than expected, in the wake of the deadly theater shooting in Colorado.

"Ice Age: Continental Drift," the fourth film in the animated series about a woolly mammoth and his prehistoric friends, trampled "The Amazing Spider-Man" at U.S. and Canadian box offices over the weekend, selling $46 million worth of tickets and reaching No. 1.

Your new friendly neighborhood Spider-Man has spun himself a $65 million opening weekend and $140 million in his first six days at U.S. theaters. Worldwide, "The Amazing Spider-Man" has climbed to $341.2 million.

For the third time this year, following strong openings from "The Hunger Games" and "Snow White and the Huntsman," a movie with a tough female protagonist topped the box office in a major way.

Despite it's all-star cast, "Rock of Ages" ekes out $15.1 million opening; "That's My Boy" grosses $13 million, marking Adam Sandler's worst opening for a comedy in eight years... Instead, it was holdovers "Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted" and "Prometheus" that continued to top the chart, staying at No. 1 and No. 2 respectively with $35.5 million and $20.2 million.

Circus animals and space beasts have lifted Hollywood to a huge weekend. The cuddly critters of "Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted" led the weekend with a $60.4 million debut domestically, followed by a big opening for Ridley Scott's alien saga "Prometheus" at No.

The Universal event pic is the first of the recent fairy tale retellings to win at the box office; Ridley Scott's "Prometheus" opens overseas to stellar $35 million from only 15 markets, nearly matching the $39.3 million grossed by "Snow White" from 45 territories.

Once again, it was all about The Avengers at the box office, as three new releases failed to even approach the Marvel superhero blockbuster’s third-weekend gross of $55.1 million, according to studio estimates. The movie dropped 47 percent — an admirable hold for a picture that’s putting up such huge numbers. By the end of Sunday, The Avengers will have made an estimated $457.1 million domestically, passing $450 million in a record 17 days. (The previous record holder, The Dark Knight, reached that milestone in 27 days.) Meanwhile, The Avengers also passed Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest to become Disney’s biggest movie ever both domestically and worldwide. It now sits in fourth place on the all-time worldwide chart, behind only Avatar, Titanic, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 2.

Wow. It certainly didn’t look that way after Thursday’s disappointing midnight screenings, but here we are. “The Avengers” has broken the all-time opening weekend box office record with a phenomenal $200.3M. That’s at least $30M more than the most optimistic projections from box office analysts.

"Hunger Games" becomes the first film since "Avatar" to spend four straight weekends at No. 1, while fellow Lionsgate pic "Cabin in the Woods" opens third with $14.9 million; "Battleship" Beat Overseas by "Titanic 3D" in surprise upset.