Global Box Office

Scarlett Johansson was firing on all cylinders as her late summer ride Lucy finished in first place with a $44 million domestic debut. This latest effort from French action maestro Luc Besson focuses on the heartpounding adventures of a woman who gains the ability to use 100% of her brain (and body) to do things like blow open concrete walls and split atoms.

The Purge 2: Anarchy fell short of sowing chaos on the Planet of the Apes as it finished a distant second to last weekend’s domestic chart topper. Its $28.

By the time it had seen just 3 sunsets, this weekend’s number one film Dawn of the Planet of the Apes had earned over $73 million. Leading actor and by this point primate behavior expert Andy Serkis returned in his starring role as Caesar the digitally augmented ape, while Jason Clarke, Keri Russell, and the incomparable Gary Oldman appeared in simple flesh and blood to round out the cast.

After a tremendous opening run Transformers: Age of Extinction is not just this weekend’s number one movie, but also that of every weekend this year to date. Michael Bay’s fourth installment of the Paramount tent-pole series, revamped with Mark Wahlberg taking the place of recently troubled star Shia Lebouf and the addition of robotic dinosaurs, earned $100 million at the domestic box office.

Laughter rang louder than music as Think Like a Man Too finished first ahead of Clint Eastwood’s adaptation of Broadways’ hit Jersey Boys to take this weekend’s top domestic honors with a $30 million close. The sequel from director Tim Story, based on Steve Harvey’s life-coaching book for women, Act like A Lady, Think Like a Man, finished just below the original’s $33.

Two champions divided the spoils over the weekend as How to Train Your Dragon 2 and 22 Jump Street managed to hit their respective target demographics with aplomb, and avoided stepping on each others tails. Both films did exceptionally well given their budgets and ambition but with its $60 million domestic haul 22 Jump Street was, in the end, the stronger contender.

Teenage darling Shailene Woodley found the chink in Tom Cruise’s armor, as her new release The Fault in Our Stars beat out the veteran leading man’s Edge of Tomorrow in this weekend’s domestic box office race. The Fox 2000 tearjerker about the ill-fated love between two cancer plagued high school students, Ms.

Angelina Jolie bewitched audiences around the world in this weekend’s number one hit Maleficent. The live action Sleeping Beauty re-imagining, from Avatar’s Academy Award winning art-director Robert Stromberg in his directorial debut, took home $171.

Now truly is the time for X-Men: Days of Future Past. After the solid performance of Rio 2 and the entirely unanticipated success of Son of God, Fox Studios can lay claim to their first true megahit of 2014 with its latest X-Men release.

Godzilla roared to a monster release as Warner Brothers’ first big summer offering scored a massive $93 million debut weekend in North America. This tally makes it the second biggest opener of 2014, nestled comfortably between Captain America 2: The Winter Soldier ($95 million) and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 ($91.