A Minecraft Movie hit cinemas last week, and it predictably took over the box office, the world and the internet.

The film — based on the highest-selling video game of all time, Minecraft — delivered a global opening weekend of $US301 million ($493 million), unseating 2023’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie as the biggest video game adaptation opening ever.

The movie centres around a washed-up gamer, a real estate agent, and two kids who find themselves sucked into The Overworld of Minecraft, where they join forces with a man trapped there years previously.

Before this weekend, box office returns were lagging 13 per cent compared with last year.

Thanks to A Minecraft Movie, that gap is down to 5 per cent.

What’s drawing people to A Minecraft Movie?

In a tale as old as time for both kids’ movies and video game adaptations, critics haven’t exactly been as kind to A Minecraft Movie as audiences have.

Review aggregators Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes have it sitting at 47 and 48 per cent, respectively, meaning less than half of official critical reviews are positive.

The mammoth box office returns and soaring audience ratings of 87 per cent on Rotten Tomatoes suggest critic scores do not really matter on films made to capitalise on what is popular with kids.

Meg Herrmann says production companies are still working out how to create viral content. ( ABC News: Christopher Gillette )

University of Queensland PhD candidate Meg Herrmann said producers were trying to find ways to bridge the gap as younger generations flocked to short-form media platforms.

“So, what we see is a few different changes that are moving away from some of the conventions that have existed in film and television for a while, where filmmakers are aware that they need to have a presence on social media platforms where people are engaging and creating their own [interpretations],” she said.

Despite big recent examples such as Disney film Encanto and Netflix show Wednesday, Ms Herrmann said the industry’s manufacturing of viral moments was still in its infancy.

“It’s helpful to look at what’s going on in the music industry to sort of get a sense of where the film industry is trying to go, because the music industry has already sort of monetised that practice in a more formalised way,” she said.

“Whereas the film industry is still kind of in its infantile stage of working out how they can exploit and extract all possible surplus value from their productions, essentially.”

‘Clippable moments’

A Minecraft Movie is filled with moments that could translate to short-form video, mainly in the form of songs performed by star Jack Black.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie also featured a massive musical number by Black, with his character Bowser going viral with Peaches and Black performing the tune at the 2023 Game Awards.

But this time, it was something slightly more quirky and organic that popped off on social media: the chicken jockey.

Videos posted on social media show audiences sitting respectfully, watching the movie, before a small square-headed zombie drops onto the back of a chicken in a boxing ring, and all hell breaks loose.

A Minecraft Movie star Jack Black has history with viral moments in movies. (AP: Scott A. Garfitt)

Black’s character, Steve, declares “chicken jockey!” and the crowd goes ballistic, throwing popcorn around, taking off their shirts and generally screaming loudly in the theatre.

Audience members getting into the trend stood up to film the furore before heading online and posting to their social media accounts, prompting others who might see the videos to take part.

Ms Herrmann said it was an example of the kind of “clippable moment” film producers were looking for, even if they had not necessarily planned this one.

“There are these quite clear moments starting to be embedded, all these clippable moments that really function as prompts or invitations for viewers to remix, edit, parody, replicate, or otherwise create additional paratexts and completely saturate the internet,” she said.

She said there were no guarantees that a planned viral moment would come off, but that production companies were packing them in, in the hope some of them got picked up.

“It’s essentially a win-win for them, because as long as it makes sense within the context of the film as a whole, there’s no loss if it doesn’t get picked up and go viral.”