Last year, I wondered if Penguins of Madagascar would do any good at the movie theater since it was already a cartoon and kids could get stories with the characters for free, so why spend money at the theater? Well, this year saw an even bigger example as SpongeBob SquarePants got his second movie and the question was answered clearly. Even for a character as long in the tooth as SpongeBob, there is a huge audience.
The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water took first place this weekend with an amazing $56 million take. Honestly, that is a huge amount of money especially when you consider that the first SpongeBob movie only opened with $32 million. It ended up as the fifth biggest February opening ever. The Lego Movie opened in this weekend last year to $69 million.
American Sniper continues to roll in the money, dropping to second but still bringing in $24.1 million to bring its overall take to $282.2 million domestically. This is a movie that has to appreciate the U.S. take since it has only made a paltry $79 million internationally.
American Sniper outdid the other two new movies that came out this weekend. The Wachowski siblings new movie, Jupiter Ascending, finished in third with a disappointing $19 million based on a $176 million budget. The other big release was the strange period action film Seventh Son, which only made $7.1 million.
Here is a look at the total weekend box office report.
Weekend Box Office
| Position | Title | Weekend | Total |
| 1 | The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water | $56M | $56M |
| 2 | American Sniper (1) | $24.1 | $282.2 |
| 3 | Jupiter Ascending | $19.0 | $19.0 |
| 4 | Seventh Son | $7.1 | $7.1 |
| 5 | Paddington (3) | $5.3 | $57.2 |
| 6 | Project Almanac (2) | $5.3 | $15.7 |
| 7 | The Imitation Game (7) | $4.8 | $75.7 |
| 8 | The Wedding Ringer (6) | $4.8 | $55.1 |
| 9 | Black or White (4) | $4.5 | $13.1 |
| 10 | The Boy Next Door (5) | $4.1 | $30.8 |
Weekend box office estimates courtesy of Box Office Mojo