WASHINGTON — Hollywood needed “A Minecraft Movie” to be a hit, and it delivered in its opening weekend, significantly narrowing this year’s box office deficit.

No one guessed just how big it would be. In its first few days in theaters, the movie earned a staggering $157 million in ticket sales from theaters in the U.S. and Canada, according to studio estimates Sunday. Internationally, it’s looking at an additional $144 million for a global debut of $301 million. And with school spring breaks ongoing, “A Minecraft Movie” is just getting started.

Not only is it the biggest opening of 2025, “A Minecraft Movie” also broke the record for a video game adaptation, a distinction previously held by “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” ($146 million). Going into the weekend, analysts projected “Minecraft” might hit $80 million. Instead, it nearly doubled that figure.

Nothing is guaranteed in the movie business, but an offering based on the best-selling video game of all time makes for a good start. It hardly mattered that the block-based game doesn’t exactly have a narrative. Many of its 200 million active monthly players turned out in droves anyway.

The PG-rated movie, directed by Jared Hess (“Napoleon Dynamite”), was a co-production of Legendary Entertainment and Warner Bros. It cost a reported $150 million to make, not including marketing and promotion expenses. Jack Black and Jason Momoa lead the ensemble cast (Danielle Brooks, Emma Myers and Sebastian Eugene Hansen). Their characters are transported into an imaginative dimension called the Overworld and need to go on a dangerous, and immensely silly, adventure to get home.

Critics were largely mixed on “A Minecraft Movie,” but audiences gave it a more promising B+ CinemaScore and 4/5 stars in PostTrak exit polls. Men made up around 62% of the audience, and 64% were under the age of 25. Warner Bros. went big on its release, opening the film in 4,263 locations domestically and 36,000 screens internationally.

“Younger audiences love going to the movie theater, believe it or not,” said Paul Dergarabedian, the senior media analyst for Comscore. “We thought this was an audience who would migrate to the small screens, but this is the perfect small screen to big screen alliance. It became a must-see theatrical event. Awareness was off the charts.”

Video game adaptations have had some pivotal successes in recent years, including “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” the “Sonic” series and “Five Nights at Freddy’s.”

“Video games were once a genre that had very mixed results at the box office, but the code has finally been cracked,” Dergarabedian said.

Second place at this week’s box office went to the Jason Statham action pic “A Working Man,” which added $7.3 million in its second weekend. Third place was occupied by the second installment in the episodic “The Chosen: Last Supper” series. Part two (made up of episodes three through five) earned $6.7 million over the weekend. The third and final batch of episodes arrive in theaters on April 11.

“Snow White” slid to fourth place in its third weekend, bringing in $6.1 million. It’s now made over $168 million globally.

It’s been a difficult start to 2025 for Hollywood and movie theaters, with disappointments including “Snow White” and “Mickey 17.” But one hit can change the tides significantly, especially with in-theater marketing pushes in full swing for the pivotal summer movie season, which kicks off the first weekend in May.

Before this weekend, the box office was running at a 13% deficit compared with last year. Now the gap is down to 5%.