Record shattered as Furious 7 sets hot pace

Scenes from the film Fast and Furious 7. Photo provided to China Daily

The Hollywood action blockbuster Furious 7, also known as Fast and Furious 7, has been quick to set a record at the box office in China.

By Tuesday night, it had taken 2.05 billion yuan ($330.5 million) since being released on the Chinese mainland on April 12, according to piaofang168. net, an online provider of real-time box office information.

The previous record was held by the 2014 sci-fi movie Transformers 4, or Transformers: Age of Extinction, which grossed 1.97 billion yuan in one month.

However, Furious 7 took only 15 days to surpass 2 billion yuan on Sunday, making it the first blockbuster on the mainland to reach this figure.

The movie has broken more than 30 records at the Chinese box office, including the single-day and first-day records.

About 52 million fans have flocked to theaters nationwide to watch more than 1 million screenings, according to Entgroup, a Chinese entertainment data service.

Most critics attribute the movie's huge success to the franchise's solid fan base in China and to the memory of lead star Paul Walker, who died at age 40 with a friend in a high-speed car crash in Santa Clarita, California, in November 2013.

Wei Huan, an analyst at Entgroup, also said that the Chinese box office slow season is in April and few big-budget domestic movies have been released during the month to compete for revenue.