Spring break boosted the box office on Friday, with Dream Works Animation’s 3D “The Croods” edging out new action thriller “Olympus Has Fallen.”
“The Croods” earned a sterling $11.6 million, and is projected to pick up around $34 million for the weekend. It features the voices of Ryan Reynolds, Emma Stone and Nicolas Cage.
The first of two White House-set action films being released this year, “Olympus” surpassed expectations for a solid $10.4 million opening. Look for the film — which stars Gerard Butler, Morgan Freeman and Aaron Eckhart — to earn around $28 million in its debut weekend.
Roland Emmerich’s similarly-themed “White House Down,” starring Jamie Foxx and Channing Tatum, opens in June. It will be interesting to see how audiences react.
Sam Raimi’s “Oz the Great and Powerful” continues to live up to its name at the box office, conjuring up another $5.6 million. So far the year’s biggest hit has earned $161.1 million.
The Halle Berry thriller “The Call” also continues to do strong business in its second weekend, as the low budget film dialed up another $2.6 million. Its domestic total now stands at $24.8 million.
Harmony Korine’s divisive “Spring Breakers” opened wide on just over 1,100 screens this weekend, after a one-week headstart in New York and L.A.
The comedy, which stars Selena Gomez, Ashley Benson and James Franco, nabbed $2.1 million, for a total of $2.5 million.
Trailing “Spring Breakers” in sixth place was the new Tina Fey-Paul Rudd comedy “Admission,” which opened on more than 2,100 screens and only took in $2 million. It will likely pick up a disappointing, but not disastrous, $6 million or so for the three-day period.
Look for complete weekend estimates Sunday on HitFix.