Taika Waititi The NZ Box Office King

Director Taika Waititi now has the top two spots in the all-time top 10 for New Zealand movies.

While his 2010 film Boy is still at number one with a local box office gross of $9,237,976, his runaway hit The Hunt for the Wilderpeople is now the number two film, grossing $7,399,091 after four weeks on release.

The film starring Sam Neill has supplanted previous number two, The World's Fastest Indian, with its total of $7,046,718.

Wilderpeople is now running second to The Jungle Book among movies screening at NZ cinemas with the Disney flick having taken in $2,574,375 in its first week ahead of $1,856,764 for Waititi's film.

But Wilderpeople only dipped slightly from its third week take of $1,922,238 which was its biggest earning so far.

Boy took nearly two months to overhaul the $7 million mark and, given Wilderpeople's momentum, it looks like the top spots will swap in the coming weeks.

NZ Herald