'Monsters University' Stands Up To 'The Heat' And 'White House Down' In Weekend Box Office

The latest venture from Pixar animations, Monsters University, spent a second week at the number one spot at the US box office, battling off competition from newcomers The Heat and White House Down. The prequel to 2001's Monsters Inc. managed to take in an impressive $46.2 million, just under half of it's taking from last week, and has currently made a massive $171 million in it's two weeks at cinemas.

Watch the Trailer for Monsters University

Close behind in second place was the Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy-starring buddy cop movie The Heat, which scooped an impressive $40 million over the weekend. Costing $43 million to make, the movie has all but recouped it's expenditure in a relatively successful weekend, whereas fellow newcomer White House Down only managed to bring in $25.7 million to land it in fourth place, behind the Brad Pitt starring World War Z. The takings for the Roland Emmerich-directed film will be particularly distressing to Sony Pictures, who spent an estimated $150 million on making the Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx-starring film.

The stars of 'White House Down' won't be happy with the takings either

See more photos from the White House Down premiere

Making up the rest of the top five was the new Superman movie Man of Steel, which took in an estimated $20 million, whilst the all-star comedy This Is The End came in sixth, followed by the magic-thriller Now You See Me. With a run in the box office longer than the runway at the end of the film, Fast & Furious 6 is still making money in cinemas and stands in eighth place, with Star Trek Into Darkness and The Internship rounding off the top ten.

Expect to see a new number one next weekend though, with new arrivals Despicable Me 2 and The Lone Ranger arriving in cinema mid-week, with both films expected to be strong performers in the box office over the July 4th long-weekend.

See more pictures from the NYC premiere of The Heat

'The Heat' performed well in it's first weekend