A Minecraft Movie has generated $301m worldwide – that’s £233m – on its opening weekend.
The live-aaction Minecraft movie has also secured the biggest domestic debut of any video game movie adaptation ever, with an opening weekend in the US of $157m (£121.5m).
Its budget was $150m (£115.7m).
Nintendo’s Super Mario Bros. Movie was similarly a monster success, beating Frozen 2 to record the largest-ever opening weekend of any animated movie. It brought in $377m (£291m) in ticket sales worldwide in its debut week, beating previous record holder Frozen 2’s $358m (£276m), and went on to gross $1.36bn.
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is the second-highest-grossing game adaptation movie ever by grossing $491m (£379m).
“I left feeling that The Minecraft Movie, something weirder and trickier and perhaps less formally careful, is out there somewhere, its bright potential untouched,” our Chris Donlan wrote in his Minecraft movie review, awarding it 3/5 stars.
“Minecraft hardly needs a film in the first place – it’s already a phenomenon, a Pandora’s Box, an essential formative aspect of the childhoods of millions of people around the world. Even so, perhaps the film this game truly deserves is, like so much else in Minecraft, still waiting to be made.”
Lead actor Jack Black believes A Minecraft Movie is just the tonic the world is in need of right now.
Speaking at the film’s premiere, Black said: “What the world needs now is love, sweet love.”
Black was originally going to portray a talking pig in the upcoming film.