Plot

In a jungle near Rio de Janeiro, a baby Spix's Macaw who is unable to fly and several other birds are captured by smugglers and taken to Moose Lake, Minnesota. The box containing the macaw falls to the street and is found by a girl named Linda (Leslie Mann), who names him "Blu". Fifteen years later, Linda lives in a bookstore with Blu (Jesse Eisenberg). Túlio (Rodrigo Santoro), a scientist, tells Linda that Blu is the last male of his species, and he needs to mate with a female to preserve it.
Linda takes Blu to Brazil, where Blu meets a female macaw named Jewel (Anne Hathaway) whom he falls for, but she cares about escaping. The shelter is raided by smugglers, who are let in by the lead smuggler's Sulphur-crested Cockatoo, Nigel (Jemaine Clement), who was posing as a sickly bird. Among them is Fernando (Jake T. Austin), a poor, orphaned boy who helps the smugglers to earn money. Blu and Jewel are captured and Nigel explains that he used to be a performing bird on a television program, but was replaced by a parakeet. Out of hatred, Nigel assists smugglers in capturing exotic birds. After he departs, Blu and Jewel escape from confinement. As they flee, Nigel chases them through Rio, and Blu and Jewel get lost in the jungle.
They meet a family of toucans, whose father, Rafael (George Lopez), offers to take them to see his friend Luiz in removing the chain. Rafael attempts to teach Blu to fly, but Blu fails. The group meets a Red-crested Cardinal named Pedro (Will.i.am) and his canary friend Nico (Jamie Foxx). Meanwhile, Nigel enlists the aid of a group of thieving marmosets and their king Mauro (Brian Baumgartner), to find Blu and Jewel. Linda and Tulio also try to find Blu, assisted by the repentant Fernando. Pedro and Nico take Blu and Jewel to a bird's samba club, where Blu starts to dance, culminating in a duet with Jewel. They are attacked by the marmosets, but their bird friends, including a Roseate Spoonbill they met at the samba club named Kipo (Bernardo de Paula) fend them off long enough for the five to escape.
Fernando leads Linda and Tulio to the smugglers' hideout, where they learn the criminals plan to use Carnivale as a cover to regain Blu and Jewel and escape. The group meets the bulldog Luiz (Tracy Morgan) who unintentionally uses his drool to release Blu and Jewel. Jewel is overjoyed but Blu is depressed because he still can not fly and they part ways. However, she is captured by Nigel. When Pedro and Nico inform Blu of Jewel's capture, he decides to mount a rescue. Linda and Tulio infiltrate Carnivale by posing as dancers, but Blu, Rafael, Nico, and Pedro are captured by Nigel. Linda and Tulio follow the smugglers, but are too late to stop them from taking off in their plane. During the flight, Blu breaks out of his cage, and they flee except for Jewel, who knows Blu is still scared of flying. Nigel grievously injures Jewel's wing. Blu manages to blast Nigel out of the plane by attaching a fire extinguisher to his leg, and hits the propeller.
Jewel is pushed out of the plane by a cage, and Blu follows her, much to her surprise. She kisses him and Blu is overcome by the rhythm of his heart, and flies, saving himself and Jewel. They return to Linda and Tulio, who attempts to tend to Jewel's hurt wing. Jewel is reluctant at first, but Blu convinces her to trust Tulio.
Sometime later, Linda and Tulio have organized the "Blu Bird Sanctuary", a part of Rio's jungle protected from smugglers. Blu and Linda remain very close, though she also has a relationship with Tulio, and is now living in Rio to help run the Blu Bird Sanctuary along with Fernando. Blu and Jewel are the parents of three chicks. The film ends with a lively song and dance from their friends and family. Nigel survives his encounter, but not without a loss of feathers and is humiliated by Mauro, who is photographing him and the smugglers are sent to jail.

Marketing

The teaser trailer of the film was released online on May 20, 2010 and then premiered a day after with the release of Shrek Forever After. It was also shown in cinemas with select screenings of Toy Story 3, Knight and Day, Despicable Me, Alpha and Omega, and Megamind. The first teaser poster for the film was released four months later. The new trailer was released online on December 8, 2010 and was also shown with Tron: Legacy, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Gulliver's Travels, Yogi Bear, and Gnomeo & Juliet. The final trailer was shown in front of Rango, Hop and Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules and it was released on April 2, 2011 on YouTube.[citation needed]
On January 27, 2011, Rovio Mobile announced a partnership with 20th Century Fox to promote the film. The game Angry Birds Rio was released in March 2011 on the Android Market and the Apple App Store with 50 levels. Rovio plans to release more levels throughout 2011.[5] A sneak peek for Angry Birds Rio (a golden egg) was available on the original Angry Birds game if the viewers found the secret code in Super Bowl XLV's commercial for Rio which would only be visible upon pausing the commercial and advancing it frame by frame.[citation needed]
The film premiered on March 22, 2011, in a Cinépolis house in Lagoa, Rio de Janeiro, attended by director Carlos Saldanha, its main stars, and musician Sérgio Mendes.[6]
A video game based on the film was released on April 12, 2011 by THQ for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, and Nintendo DS. It has a Party-genre similar that of the Mario Party series.
Like African Cats, the film also includes a Regular Show short, Mordecai and Rigby: Ringtoneers, shown in some prints of the film in theaters and the Ice Age short, Scrat's Continental Crack-up.
In April 2011, Oreo announced its special edition Oreo cookies with blue cream in promotion of the film. The promotion included stickers inside each package of cookies. Two types of contests were also announced: first, by completing an album of stickers, consumers could win three movie passes and medium snack bar combos; second, by finding winning stickers in packages with prizes including a trip to Rio de Janeiro, backpacks, cinema passes for a year, and 3D glasses. The promotion ends May 30, 2011, or until stock is exhausted.[7] The promotion is available in Ecuador, Peru, and Colombia.[8]
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Release

[edit]Box-office
Rio has made $89,227,015 in North America, as of April 28, 2011, along with $227,190,676 in other territories, as of April 27, 2011, which totals up to $316,417,691 worldwide, becoming the highest grossing film of 2011 so far, and the first film of 2011 to pass the $300-million mark.[10]
North America
Rio debuted with $39,225,962 during its opening weekend on approximately 6,400 screens at 3,826 theaters. It ranked number one at the box office surpassing the other new wide release, Scream 4, which ranked second.[11] This was the highest-grossing opening weekend so far for a 2011 film.[12] It also scored the largest opening weekend in April for an animated feature, and the fifth largest in April overall.[13] On its second weekend (Easter weekend) it retained first place at the box office, dropping only 33% to $26.3 million, therefore surpassing that weekend's releases, Tyler Perry's Madea's Big Happy Family ($25.1 million), Water for Elephants ($16.8 million) and African Cats ($6.0 million), which ranked second, third and sixth respectively.[14]
Other territories
On its first weekend overseas (the weekend before its release in North America) it topped the box office with $54.9 million from 11,714 screens in 72 countries.[15] On its second weekend it earned $55.4 million, still on top of the overseas box office[16] and on its third weekend it remained at the summit of the box office, grossing an estimated $44.3 million. It therefore marked the second movie that succeeded in topping the overseas box office three times in 2011, joining Tangled, although it is the only one that did it on three consecutive weekends.[17]
In Russia, it topped the box office with $11,305,530 during its opening weekend (including weekday previews), surpassing Tangled for the largest all-time opening of a non-sequel animated movie. In Brazil, it grossed a record-breaking $8,349,383, the largest opening weekend of all time in the territory.[18] On its second weekend it earned $7.2 million, falling just 14% from its opening. As of April 17, 2011 it has earned $18,753,027.[19]

Theatrical poster with Brazilian release date
Directed by Carlos Saldanha
Produced by John C. Donkin
Bruce Anderson
Chris Wedge
Screenplay by Don Rhymer
Joshua Sternin
Jeffrey Ventimilia
Todd R.Jones
Earl Richey Jones
Story by Carlos Saldanha
Starring Jesse Eisenberg
Anne Hathaway
George Lopez
Music by John Powell
Cinematography Renato Falcão
Editing by Harry Hitner
Studio Blue Sky Studios
Distributed by 20th Century Fox
Release date(s) April 8, 2011 (Brazil)
April 15, 2011 (North America)
Running time 96 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Portuguese
Budget $90 million[1]
Gross revenue $316,417,691[2