Bohemian Rhapsody has knocked A Star Is Born off the top of the UK box office, after grossing an impressive £6.48 million in its opening weekend.
The Queen biopic, which has seen Rami Malek receive rave reviews for his performance as Freddie Mercury, went straight to the top spot and defeated the Lady Gaga drama off the top spot after a reign of two weeks.
It is also on course to become the highest grossing music biopic ever released in the UK – beating the likes of Eminem‘s 8 Mile and Johnny Cash movie Walk The Line which secured £13.3 million and £10.4 million respectively.
But despite being knocked from the top spot after a fortnight, A Star Is Born still secured over £2 million, meaning that it has secured £19.2 million after less than 30 days at the cinema.
Bohemian Rhapsody is the fourth musical film to secure the top spot this year – following on from The Greatest Showman, Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again and A Star Is Born.
The impressive opening comes despite the film facing mixed reviews, with some critics finding faults in the portrayal of Mercury’s life story.
“Despite its electrifying subject, is a conventional, middle-of-the-road, cut-and-dried, play-it-safe, rather fuddy-duddy old-school biopic, a movie that skitters through events instead of sinking into them. And it treats Freddie’s personal life — his sexual-romantic identity, his loneliness, his reckless adventures in gay leather clubs — with kid-gloves reticence”, wrote Variety’s Owen Gleiberman.
Meanwhile, Malek recently clarified whether his vocals feature in the film.