Hangover Part II breaks box office record

(Bang Showbiz)

'The Hangover Part II' has grossed over $488 million (£301.2 million) to become the most globally successful R-rated comedy ever.

The sequel - which reunites original cast members Zach Galifianakis, Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms and Justin Bartha for the movie set in Bangkok - took in $21.4 million this weekend, surpassing the $468 million generated from the first movie and bringing the combined total to almost one billion dollars.

Animated sequel 'Kung Fu Panda' also had a successful weekend, making $52.5 million to bring its worldwide total to $423.3 million while 'Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides' took in $25.9 million for a total of $731.9 million.

'X-Men: First Class' and 'Green Lantern' rounded out the top five making $21.2million and $17 million respectively.

Following on from the box office success of 'The Hangover Part II', it is likely the cast and crew will return for a third film in the franchise with star Zach - who plays Alan Garner in the Todd Phillips-directed films - already getting calls about it.

He said: "They want to do a 'Hangover 3'. I'm getting fricking phone calls already."

Filmmaker Todd has previously revealed another film in the series would be the last and thought it would be good to change the "template" of the franchise.

He said: "If we were to do a third one, and quite honestly we really haven't talked about it. I think we have a clear idea where that would head and it's certainly not in the same template you've seen these movies and obviously we always envisioned it as a trilogy as you can imagine, the third would very much a finale and an ending."