A roaring success! Lion King dominates the box office on debut weekend

A star-studded version of The Lion King dominated the box office in its opening weekend, and had the most successful first three days of any Disney remake.

The movie, directed by Jon Favreau, collected $185m (£149m) from nearly 5,000 theatres in North America over its opening weekend – beating other remakes including Beauty And The Beast.

It’s the second-best US domestic debut of the year – trailing Avengers: Endgame, which took $357m (£285.5m) in three days.

Overseas, The Lion King took $269m (£215m) for a global total of $433m (£346m).

The state-of-the-art technology used to bring the Pride Lands to life in the film has divided opinion, but it has been critic-proof, with fans flocking to see Simba on the big screen.

A cast boasting Donald Glover and Beyonce will have helped bring punters to seats around the world.

Imax theatres accounted for $9m (£7m) of total sales.

It comes as Avatar was finally knocked off the top spot for highest-grossing film, with Avengers: Endgame taking $2.7892bn (£2.2bn) around the world.

Other studios opted not to release films in direct competition to The Lion King, meaning Spider-Man: Far From Home took just $21m (£16.7m) and Toy Story 4 took $14m (£11m).

Disney’s previous remakes include Beauty And The Beast, which took $174m (£139m) in its first weekend, Alice In Wonderland, which took $116m (£92.7m), and Favreau’s The Jungle Book, which took $103m (£82m).

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