Friday Box Office: “Snow White” performs better than expected, “Avengers” breaks another record

Breaking the streak of post-“Avengers” under-performers, “Snow White and the Huntsman” took command of the box office this Friday, with a solid $20.3m take, positioning it to rake in a better-than-expected $55.8m on the weekend. The movie still has a long road to profitability, with a production budget of $175m (which doesn’t include P&A), but the good news is that this is not another “Battleship”-sized disaster for Universal.

Meanwhile, the summer’s only big hit thus far, “The Avengers”, became the #3 domestic grosser of all-time, surpassing “The Dark Knight”‘s $533m total, not even four weeks into its run. While it’s highly unlikely that the Marvel Comics adaptation will topple “Avatar”‘s record of $760m, it has a small chance of beating the other James Cameron movie in the top 2 — “Titanic,” which thanks to a recent 3-D re-release now towers at $658m.

You know the drill — check out the full chart after the jump…

No.	Title	Friday	CS Weekend Projection	Theaters
1	Snow White and the Huntsman	$20.3M	$55.8M	3,773
2	Men in Black 3	$8.3M	$26.6M	4,248
3	The Avengers	$5.7M	$21.6M	3,670
4	What to Expect When You’re Expecting	$1.5M	$4.5M	2,907
5	Battleship	$1.4M	$4.2M	3,144
6	The Dictator	$1.4M	$4.2M	2,649
7	The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel	$1.3M	$5.1M	1,294
8	Dark Shadows	$1.1M	$3.3M	3,002
9	Chernobyl Diaries	$1.0M	$2.8M	2,433
10	For Greater Glory	$0.6M	$1.7M	757

Source: Box Office Mojo