UK Box Office 4 - 6 January 2013

Unlike the rest of us, cinema is not experiencing a post-Christmas hangover with the box office delivering another super-strong weekend, up 61% from the same weekend last year. That’s now TWELVE consecutive weekends where the box office has been up on the equivalent from a year ago. For the fourth weekend in succession, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey 3D came out on top but it was run mighty close by The Impossible.

The Hobbit fell 41% to £4.1m and it now stands on an imposing £44.9m. At its current rate, it has a good chance of at least catching the lowest performing Lord Of The Rings film, The Two Towers (£57.6m). True life tsunami drama, The Impossible made a very promising start with £4m, with £1.6m of that coming from Tuesday to Thursday previews. Those previews enabled it to finish ahead of Life Of Pi 3D, which continued its terrific performance with a further £3.4m, taking its cume to £17.9m. With Oscar and BAFTA nominations due out in the next week, there should be plenty more to come.

In fourth spot was geriatric comedy Quartet, which had a solid debut of £2.3m. Like The Impossible, that figure included Tuesday to Thursday previews (£984k), so it was slightly less impressive than The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’s £2.3m opening in March 2012, but it was still a promising start. Jack Reacher rounded out the top five with £1.7m taking its cume to £7.2m. One other notable performer was Parental Guidance which fell just 6% (once previews are removed) for a weekend total of £884k and a cume of £3.4m. Cinema’s hot streak looks like it’ll continue this coming weekend with the long awaited release of Les Misérables, stylish crime epic Gangster Squad and 3D gore-fest Texas Chainsaw 3D.

In the US, Texas Chainsaw 3D's $23m opening bodes well for its UK release this week. The audience was 52% female and 64% under 25 year-of-age. Quentin Tarantino’s epic western Django Unchained fell 33% to $20.1m and a cume of $106.4m. Expect similar success here in the UK when it opens on the 18th. In third place, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey 3D fell 45% to $17.5m and a cume of $263.8m, and it should make it to $300m. On its second weekend, Les Misérables added a further $16.1m and passed $100m on Sunday. Parental Guidance rounded out the top 5 with another $10.1m taking its cume to a solid $52.8m.