Lilo & Stitch beats Mission Impossible in UK box office battle

A sci-fi comedy about a koala-like alien is proving more of a hit with cinemagoers in the UK and Ireland than Tom Cruise’s latest spy thriller.

Lilo & Stitch took £9.6 million at the combined box office in both countries on its first weekend of release, beating the £8.6 million grossed by Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning.

Both films were released in cinemas in time for the long bank holiday weekend, with The Final Reckoning – tipped to be Tom Cruise’s last outing as secret agent Ethan Hunt – the favourite to pull in the crowds.

But Cruise has been outperformed by furry blue extra-terrestrial Stitch and his adventures on Earth with young girl Lilo, who adopts the unpredictable and somewhat tempestuous creature as her pet.

The Final Reckoning is the eighth instalment in the Mission: Impossible film franchise – the first appeared in 1996 – and continues the storyline of the preceding movie, Dead Reckoning Part One.

Lilo & Stitch is also part of a franchise, but one that is neither as long nor as convoluted as Cruise’s decade-spanning blockbusters.

The characters first appeared in an animated film of the same name in 2002, which led to a TV series and several direct-to-video sequels.

Box office figures have been published by the British Film Institute using data from Comscore.

They cover the period up to May 25, so do not include screenings on Monday, which was a bank holiday in the UK but not in Ireland.

The highest-grossing film so far this year at the combined UK and Ireland box office is A Minecraft Movie, which has now taken £55.8 million.

The second biggest film is Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy, which has taken £46.4 million.