300 SEQUEL DOMINATES OVERSEAS

Overseas, 300: Rise of an Empire laid its rivals to waste as it plundered $87.8 million, more than four times what the No. 2 film, Mr. Peabody & Sherman, earned ($21 million). It was also up 10 percent over the original 300 at the international box office, Warner Bros. said Sunday, and it pushed its worldwide total to $132.9 million. The biggest market for the movie was Russia, where it seized $9.2 million (and where newspapers were filled with reports about the country’s military intervention in the Crimean peninsula.) Meanwhile, in its third week, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug continued to pile up receipts in China, where it racked up $8 million in ticket sales to bring its foreign total to $680 million and its worldwide total to $937 million. It’s due to open in Japan on Friday.