IconEntertainment's The Passion Of The Christ showed that it could play beyond traditional US and European strongholds over the weekend, placing number one in the market in five Asianterritories for Fox International. In South Korea, where 49% of the population is Christian, it amassed a huge $2.3m opening on 157 screens.

The film opened with $0.9m in The Philippines on 132screens, it took $0.58m in Singapore on 32 screens and $0.57m in Hong Kong on39 screens. It held over at number one in Taiwan in its second weekend for atotal of $0.89m.

Meanwhile, inLatin America, where Fox also has rights to the film, Passion has now brought its total to $31.5m. Itwas number one in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador andPanama and, in Mexico, it is now the third biggest grossing Fox film of alltime with a total take of $14.5m.