MOSCOW, January 13. /TASS/. Cheburashka, a family comedy that raked in over 3.5 billion rubles ($51 million) at the box office, outpaced Avatar, the 2009 film by James Cameron, to become the highest-grossing film in Russian history.

Since its cinematic release on January 1, Dmitry Dyachenko’s Cheburashka has earned 3,528,556,464 rubles ($51.6 million), according to data from the Unified Federal Automated Information System of Theatrical Film Distribution. The Film Distributor’s Newsletter, an industry publication, said Avatar made 3,516,796,661 rubles ($51.4 million in current dollar terms).

On January 10, Cheburashka surpassed the previous top-grossing movie, Serf, a Klim Shipenko film with box office revenues of 2.8 billion rubles ($40 million in current dollar terms).

The comedy tells the story of Cheburashka’s adventures in a small seaside town where he arrives from a faraway country.