‘Big Hero 6’ has box office superpowers, beats ‘Interstellar’

This image released by Disney shows animated characters Hiro Hamada, voiced by Ryan Potter, left, and Baymax, voiced by Scott Adsit, in a scene from “Big Hero 6.” AP

Animated comedy “Big Hero 6” proved to have superpowers in the weekend battle for the box office, fighting off sci-fi epic “Interstellar” to claim top spot, industry estimates showed Sunday.

“Big Hero 6,” which features a 14-year-old genius and an inflatable robot called Baymax, opened with a weekend haul of $56.2 million, according to box office tracker Exhibitor Relations

The performance was enough to beat out Christopher Nolan’s sweeping space odyssey, “Interstellar,” where astronauts travel through a wormhole in search of a new habitable planet. The heavily hyped film came in second with $50 million.

Well behind in third place was the David Fincher thriller “Gone Girl,” starring Ben Affleck. The film, which has earned more than $145 million after six weeks in theaters, pulled in another $6.1 million at the North American box office this weekend.

Horror movie “Ouija,” down from last week’s top spot, took in $6 million, for fourth place.

In fifth place, “St. Vincent,” a comedy starring Bill Murray, Melissa McCarthy and Naomi Watts, earned $5.7 million.

At number six was the Brad Pitt World War II tank drama “Fury,” with $5.5 million.

“Nightcrawler,” which stars Jake Gyllenhaal as a sleazy videojournalist, slipped to seventh place, down from the number two slot a week earlier. It pulled in $5.3 million.

In eighth place was “John Wick,” starring Keanu Reeves as an ex-hitman, which scored $4.1 million in ticket sales.

Ninth was Disney’s “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day” — based on a children’s book of the same name and starring Steve Carell and Jennifer Garner. It made $3.5 million.

And rounding out the top ten was animated comedy “The Book of Life,” featuring the voices of Zoe Saldana and Channing Tatum, with $2.8 million.