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The 3D re-release of Titanic has broken box office records in China to garner the biggest opening of all time in the country.James Cameron's romantic epic of short-lived love on board the doomed ocean liner took a staggering $58m (£36.6m), a far higher figure than it has achieved in North America, where it has so far taken just $44.5m in two weeks. The Chinese figure helped the film pass the $2bn mark at the global box office, a feat only surpassed by Cameron's own 2009 sci-fi smash Avatar, which stands as the highest grossing movie of all time with $2.8bn.

The Chinese figure means Titanic has already taken more money in the country in the last six days than it did in 1998, when the film was originally released there. Such a figure is less surprising given that the number of cinemas in the nation has more than doubled in the past five years. Box office records in China tend to tumble each time a high-profile film is released, because so many more people are now able to find a cinema in their immediate locale.