Kung Fu Panda 3 kicked its way to the top of the North American box office with $41 million, according to Rentrak estimates on Sunday.
The DreamWorks Animation film cost a reported $145 million to make and earned a strong “A” CinemaScore from audiences 70 per cent of whom were families.
“It’s a bold move to take a franchise which has had great success in that summer corridor and move it into late January, which is generally considered a very slow time,” Rentrak’s senior media analyst Paul Dergarabedian said. “It also filled a huge void in the marketplace.”
The first film opened to $60.2 million in 2008 and the second to $47.7 million in 2011.
For Fox, switching up the release was a no-brainer after seeing the successes of The Lego Movie and last year’s The SpongeBob Movie - Sponge Out of Water in this time frame.
“We know that when the market conditions are right, this really is a 365-day-a-year business,” said Chris Aronson, Fox’s domestic distribution chief. “We saw an opportunity and we grabbed it. We’re thrilled with the results.”
The animated sequel also fared much better than the weekend’s other new openers, like Disney’s Coast Guard adventure The Finest Hours , which debuted in fourth place with $10.3 million.
Based on a real life 1952 rescue mission, The Finest Hours stars Chris Pine, Casey Affleck and Ben Foster and cost around $80 million to make.
The Fifty Shades of Grey parody Fifty Shades of Black , meanwhile, earned a modest $6.2 million, but it only cost a reported $5 million to produce. Marlon Wayans co-wrote, stars in and produced the R-rated takeoff.
