Indiana Jones raids box office coffers

Despite costing a whopping $185 million to make, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas’ latest cinema outing Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull made an estimated $311 million worldwide in its opening weekend, the Associated Press

reports

.

Coming 19 years after the release of Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade, Harrison Ford’s elderly depiction of his likeable adventurous rogue enjoyed the second most profitable opening weekend in US box office history.

The only film to do better is Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, which made $160 million in the US and Canada in its first weekend – $9 million more than Indiana.

Indiana’s popularity marks a solid month for distributor Paramount, which also saw the money rolling in off the back of Marvel flick Ironman.

The success comes in stark contrast to Speed Racer, which was directed by the Wachowski Brothers – the pair behind the cult Matrix sci-fi trilogy. To date that film has made less than $70 million – failing so far to recoup the $120 million filming costs