‘A Minecraft Movie’ breaks box office record after huge opening weekend
A Minecraft Movie exceeded expectations at the box office this weekend, grossing $157 million domestically in the United States. This represents the biggest opening weekend for a movie adaptation of a video game in history.
This record was previously held by The Super Mario Bros Movie, also starring Jack Black, which grossed $146 million domestically over the first three days. The Mario movie opened on a Wednesday to the Easter holiday, with its five-day total being $204 million, leading it to gross over $1.3 billion worldwide and becoming the second highest-grossing film of 2023 after Barbie.
Starring Black and Jason Momoa, A Minecraft Movie has led to one of the most popular video games of all time being brought to the big screen. While The Super Mario Bros Movie wasn’t met well by critics, A Minecraft Movie has also been met with mixed reviews, however, it’s been a huge success commercially.
Although the Super Mario Bros. movie exceeds the Minecraft movie in online ratings, it still signals another success for a video game film adaptation, which has slowly seen a surge in popularity over the last three years. Three Sonic the Hedgehog films have been released since 2020, as have adaptations of the popular Five Nights at Freddy’s series, which became one of the biggest horror hits of the year.
As well as this, games like The Last of Us and Fallout have also been adapted for television. There are many more video game adaptations in the works, with a live-action version of The Legends of Zelda currently being in the works, as well as a Sims movie from Margot Robbie’s production company, Lucky Chap. A sequel to the Super Mario Bros Movie will also be released in 2026.
Last week, Black said of the importance of A Minecraft Movie right now: “What the world needs now is love, sweet love. We’ve got to work together, my God. There’s so much violence and war and hatred. And that’s what I love about this movie — there’s a lot of love in it and there’s a lot of creativity. There is some anger and violence too, but in the end it’s about friendship and working together to make [the world] a better place.”
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