U.K. Box Office: 'Minions' Scores Biggest Opening Ever for Animated Film

Universal scores a one-two punch at the top as 'Jurassic World' is finally knocked from its perch.

The U.K. box office has gone from gigantic genetically modified dinosaur hybrids straight to diminutive yellow super villain servants.

Minions has finally knocked Jurassic World from its record-breaking perch at the top of the U.K. box office, in doing so beating the likes of Toy Story and Frozen to bring in the biggest animated feature three-day opening of all time in Britain. The results across the Atlantic are no doubt encouraging for Universal and Illumination Entertainment, who are launching the first spinoff from their Despicable Me franchise in the U.S. on July 10.

The Minions debut haul of $18.2 million was double that of Jurassic World’s third-week revenue in the U.K. and was just enough to see off Toy Story 3’s $18.0 million in 2010 to snatch the animated record, at least before inflation is taken into account.

Jurassic World, meanwhile, saw its total U.K. box-office figures hit $76.6 million, making it not just the biggest hit of 2015 so far, but bigger than any title in the U.K. since 2012’s Skyfall.

Overall, with two films — and a Universal one-two punch — claiming more than 80 percent of the cumulative top 10 total, the market was relatively flat.

Spy claimed the third spot in its fourth week with just shy of $1 million, while Entourage’s second week earnings of $425,000 put it in the sixth spot and brought its total gross to $2 million, perhaps indicating that British audiences don’t have quite the taste for Hollywood inside jokes (although some negative reviews probably didn’t help either).

The week’s only new entries were Eli Roth’s horror movie Knock Knock, which took a few cents short of $400,000 for seventh position, and Sundance-winning indie western Slow West, which took the last spot of the top 10 with a snip over $200,000.

Next week, however, should see a serious topless tussle at the top, with the launch of Terminator Genisys and Magic Mike XXL. There's also a candidate for broken records in the documentary arena, with the release of Asif Kapadia's critically acclaimed film about the life and untimely demise of Amy Winehouse, Amy.