Catch Me If You Can swept through a host of new territories over the weekend notching up more than $15.5m from the nine territories that received it.

These openings included UIP's launches in three major European territories: Germany, Italy and the UK.

The unquestionable box office draw of megastar triumvirate Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hanks and director Steven Spielberg produced a $5.3m (Euros 4.95m) four-day weekend in Germany from 705 screens. The comedic drama placed first, scoring an opening weekend screen average of $7,539 - almost identical to that of Spielberg's last release Minority Report, which claimed an average of $7,852 from 782 screens on opening in Germany last October.

In Italy Catch Me If You Can opened to a resounding $2.35m three-day weekend recorded from 374 screens for a strong average of $6,291. This result saw the film knock two-week leader The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers down to second place (on $2.2m). Another DiCaprio-led film, Gangs Of New York, ranked third with $1.7m after dropping off 41% from its launch in Italy last weekend.

Audiences in the UK and Ireland also responded well to the film, where it again managed to steal the top spot, this time from two-week champ 8 Mile. Catch Me If You Can opened at 459 sites in the territory for a $6.1m (£3.7m) result - an average of $13,333 per location. This included $736,331 of previews taken from 356 sites on Wednesday and Thursday (Jan 29 and 30).

The trio appear popular as ever in the UK. Spielberg's Minority Report was the 11th highest earner released in 2002 with $33.9m; Hanks-starrer Road To Perdition notched up $11m last year; DiCaprio's Gangs Of New York has taken $15m after four weekends on release and is still going strong.

Impressive results were also noted in Switzerland where the film launched in the German-speaking region of the country, taking first place with $767,948 (SFR 1.05m) from 68 screens - a mighty average of $11,293. Catch Me If You Can opens in the French-speaking region of Switzerland on Feb 12.

Other UIP European launches included Austria ($684,858) and Turkey ($465,312) - playing at 98 screens in both territories - and Slovenia ($54,763 from nine). It took $40,531 (ISK 3.1m) in Iceland giving local distributor Samfilm top place and a $10,133 average from four screens.

It also launched, again for UIP, this weekend in the Philippines ($249,575 from 52 screens) and Thailand ($238,147 from 63).

Dropping just 19% in its second weekend in Spain, Catch Me If You Can claimed a further $1.6m , bringing its 10-day cumulative total to $4.2m. The film has an international tally of over $40m so far to add to its $152.2m US take. It opens in the Netherlands and Hungary this weekend and next in France and Belgium on Feb 12.