HUNGER GAMES EARNS $10.35 MILLION ON TUESDAY

There was no let-up in demand for tickets for The Hunger Games on Tuesday. For the second weekday in a row sales topped $10 million. ($10.82 million on Monday, $10.35 million on Tuesday.) The film opened to strong but not overwhelming business overseas, with the U.K. leading the pack with $7.80 million. That made it the biggest opening of the year, but nothing to challenge recent results for the latest Twilight movies. But Britain’s Guardian newspaper pointed out that those movies did not start out spectacularly in the U.K. either, with the original opening with just $3.98 million. Said Lionsgate’s U.K. chief Zygi Kamasa: “We hoped to be better than Twilight’s UK opening, and in fact we are very nearly double that.”