娱乐英语新闻:"Mermaid" outswims Spring Festival box office competition

BEIJING, Feb. 18 (Xinhua) -- Domestic sci-fi comedy "The Mermaid" was the queen of the Chinese box office in the week ending Feb. 14, pulling in about 1.79 billion yuan (about 274 million U.S. dollars).

The film, by Hong Kong director and comedian Stephen Chow, was released on Feb. 8, Chinese New Year's Day.

Comedy-action "From Vegas to Macau III," starring Hong Kong actors Chow Yun-fat and Andy Lau, scored about 775.6 million yuan after opening on Feb. 8 to be a respectable No. 2 in the week, China Film News reported on Thursday.

"From Vegas to Macau III," was closely followed by "The Monkey King 2," which earned 759.6 million yuan in the seven days. The comedy-fantasy was also released on Feb. 8.

Fourth place went to animated comedy "Kung Fu Panda 3," with 154.1 million yuan. By the end of the week, it had pulled in more than 831.6 million yuan since its debut on Jan. 29.

Rounding out the top five was domestic romance "Run for Love," which earned 35.6 million yuan in the week, after opening on Valentine's Day. Enditem