Overseas Moolah

Liam Neeson, action hero, dominated foreign ticket booths, and Bruce Willis came back strong with his time travel movie, but what of animation?

... DreamWorks Animation’s Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted continues to chug along, generating $23.3 million on the weekend at 2,453 locations in 29 markets. A No. 1 opening in Germany accounted for the higher gross this round, contributing $15.4 million from 740 venues. A first place ranking in Austria added $1.3 million at 81 locations. Overseas gross total now stands at $451 million ...

Hotel Transylvania drew $13.1 million from at 2,985 screens in 22 markets, lifting its early foreign cume to $29.3 million. A No. 1 Brazil debut for the family animation outing in 3D delivered $2.9 million ...

Ted has grossed a total of $232.9 million overseas thus far with five territories still to open including France and Belgium this week. (Worldwide,Ted has grossed some $450 million.) ... Ice Age: Continental Drift surpassed the $700 million gross mark overseas ($702.6 million) thanks to a $5.7 million weekend ...

[But that's not all!] Disney’s Brave, $291 million; Universal’s Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax, $127.1 million; Disney’s Finding Nemo 3D, $11.6 million ...

There are a whole raft of things to highlight here, so let's whip out our Magic Marker:

1) Back when The Lorax was released, entertainment media was quick to point out that movies based on Dr. Seuss's works "didn't perform well overseas," and it's true that Lorax has earned more in the U.S. of A. than abroad. However, if almost any live-action feature made over $127 million in foreign box office, it would not be called a failure, but a strong success. (Worldwide, The Lorax has made $341,130,000.)

2) Ice Age: Continental Drift has now earned $859 million across the globe. Want to know the movie that is powering Fox's bottom-line, since James Cameron isn't releasing anything at the moment? It's this Blue Sky Studios production.

(The continuing robustness of the Ice Ages and other American animated features might be a clue why Fox was happy to take on distribution duties for DreamWorks Animation's product. Which leads to the last factoid:)

3) DreamWorks Animation's latest Madagascar sequel has picked up a total of $667,132,292 here and abroad.

All the above leads me to conclude that our fine entertainment conglomerates will continue to expand their production of theatrical animated features.