'Rio' flies high at worldwide box offices

Moviegoers around the world headed to "Rio" for the weekend.

The 3D animated misadventure of a Brazilian macaw opened at No 1 in North America after selling about USD 40 million worth of tickets, and it led the field overseas for a second weekend, distributor 20th Century Fox said on Sunday.

The USD 90 million cartoon scored the biggest opening of the year in North America, and came in at the high end of expectations in the USD 30 million to USD 40 million range. Its foreign total rose to about USD 128 million.

The cartoon revolves around Blu, a rare blue macaw (voiced by Jesse Eisenberg of "The Social Network"), who returns to his native Brazil after a coddled existence as a smuggled pet in the United States.

It was directed by Carlos Saldanha, the Rio de Janeiro-born director of the "Ice Age" trilogy. Both those films and "Rio" were produced by Blue Sky Studios, and distributed by News Corp-owned Fox.

Opening at No 2 in North America with considerably less success was "Scream 4," the first installment in the horror franchise in 11 years.

The Dimension Films release sold about USD 19.3 million worth of tickets across the United States and Canada. Industry insiders had expected the bloody reunion of David Arquette, Courteney Cox and Neve Campbell to open in the mid-USD 20 million range. Dimension is a unit of the closely held Weinstein Co.

After two weekends at No 1, Universal Pictures' Easter bunny cartoon "Hop" slipped to No 3 with USD 11.2 million. Its total stands at USD 82.6 million. Universal is a unit of NBC Universal, which is controlled by Comcast Corp.