Marvel’s superhero in Captain America: The Winter Soldier claimed a third straight box office win, collecting $26.6 million at the domestic box office to beat the colorful birds of animated film Rio 2, which generated $22.5 million in ticket sales.
Heaven Is for Real, based on a best-selling Christian book about a boy who claims to have witnessed heaven during surgery, was a strong third at U.S. and Canadian theaters with $21.5 million over the Easter holiday weekend.
Transcendence, the science fiction thriller starring Johnny Depp as an artificial intelligence researcher, was a disappointing fourth with $11.2 million in ticket sales, according to studio estimates provided by tracking firm Rentrak.
Captain America, which stars Chris Evans as a scrawny World War Two reject given super powers from an experimental serum, is the latest superhero hit from Disney’s Marvel Studios.
The film has earned a global total of $586 million, including more than $200 million domestically, since it started rolling out internationally on March 26, validating the strategy of distributor Disney to ramp up its pipeline of films featuring Marvel Comics super heroes.
Rio 2 features the voices of Jesse Eisenberg and Anne Hathaway as blue Spix macaw birds, and follows recent big ticket weekends for animated films like Frozen and The Lego Movie, which lured kids and their parents to movie theaters.
Heaven is for Real stars Greg Kinnear in the story of a young boy who claims he witnessed Heaven during emergency surgery. It opened on Wednesday night and was expected to total $28.5 million in ticket sales through Sunday, according to Sony, which distributed the film through its TriStar Pictures unit.
Transcendence marked the directorial debut for long-time cinematographer Wally Pfister, who won the 2010 Academy Award for his work on Inception.
With a budget of $100 million, it was projected to open with ticket sales of $21 million, according to the website Box Office Mojo.
A Haunted House 2, a horror comedy starring Marlon Wayans, rounded out the top five with $9.1 million in ticket sales. The film opened in about 2,300 theaters, compared with more than 3,400 for Transcendence.
— Sun Media News Services
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