Crocodile Dundee In LA, the third film in Australia's most successful franchise ever, was the most popular film over the Easter weekend grossing A$2.25m ($1.13m) from 234 screens from its opening Thursday April 12 to Monday April 16. In its favour were two public holidays, but these were offset by superb autumn weather in most of the key markets.

School holidays and yet another public holiday next week will continue to help it along. The result is strong despite some reviews painting the film as so awful that the news spilled into the first few pages of several key newspapers, and in one case the front page.

Distributor UIP marketed Crocodile Dundee In LA as good clean fun for the whole family and that is exactly who is going. A total gross of more than $5m is predicted, which would make it a success by usual standards but a disappointment considering that the original Crocodile Dundee took a massive $24m in 1986 and was Australia's biggest film until Titanic sank it over 10 years later. The second also performed well, taking nearly $12.6m in 1988.

Unusually for an Australian film, most territories were pre-sold worldwide before production began. Australia is the first market in which it has opened with Paramount releasing it in the US on Friday, April 20.