To the surprise of absolutely no one, the Easter weekend box office was dominated by family and teen fare, with the highly anticipated Furious 7 coming out on top.
It just goes to show the Fast & Furious franchise has not lost appeal even in its seventh instalment with the high action thriller, known for its insane car stunts, scooping a mighty $14,546,688 ($14,891,383 including previews) over 257 locations in its opening weekend. Distributed by Universal Pictures, it is their highest grossing franchise of all time.
At the time of writing, Furious 7 was up 233 per cent in its popularity on imdb.com and also has an 82 per cent approval rating on film review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes.
It is also tragically the last film in which the late Paul Walker will appear, after his death in November, 2013. It is understood that while he had already filmed the majority of his scenes for Furious 7, his brothers, along with another actor, John Brotherton, stood in his place to film the remainder.
Disney’s Cinderella continued to delight families in its second week, taking $3,130,038 across 266 screens. The fairy tale has so far enchanted Aussie audiences, with a total of $9,236,915 at the Australian box office.
Fox’s animated family feature Home has also proved popular, scooping a neat $1,916,189 over 272 screens in its third week. According to reports released by Rentrak, the film has amassed $8,013,914 in Australia so far.
Continuing the animation theme, Spongebob Squarepants: Sponge out of Water debuted in 259 locations, taking $1,313,546. Including previews, this takes the sponge’s overall Australian earnings to $2,200,788. Sponge out of Water is distributed by Paramount Pictures.
Catering to the teen market, Insurgent came in fifth on the box office chart with a cool $1,171,472 over 269 screens in its third week. The dystopian drama, distributed by eONE, has so far clocked up $9,101,799.
Warner Bros’ Get Hard managed to rake in over the million dollar mark in its second week of release, acooping $1,027,590 over 154 screens. The buddy comedy has amassed $3,447,119 at the Aus box office so far.
Kooky teen comedy The DUFF missed its mark with the Aussie market, taking only $826,063 over 169 screens in its opening weekend. The Roadshow-distributed high school tale follows the frumpy Bianca (Mae Whitman) who discovers she is known throughout school as the DUFF – Designated Ugly Fat Friend. She enlists the help of handsome jock Wesley (Robbie Amell) to reinvent herself.
Preschooler fare Shaun the Sheep was shown across 235 screens, scooping a respectable $792,433 in its second week. The Studio Canal-distributed animation has taken $1,834,935 in total.
Rounding out the top ten were The Second Best Marigold Hotel which earned $402,913 over 174 screens in week six, boosting its Aus box office takings to $15,031,454; while Focus slipped to a weekend taking of $222,130 in 121 locations in its fifth week, with an Aus box office total of $8,424,914 so far. The films were distributed by Fox and Warner Bros. respectively.