Paddington stays top at the UK box office

Paddington's human co-stars include Hugh Bonneville, Sally Hawkins and Julie Walters

Children's favourite Paddington has maintained pole position at the UK and Ireland box office for a second week.

The family adventure took £3.8m, keeping the latest instalment of dystopian epic The Hunger Games at bay.

Animated spin-off Penguins of Madagascar was the two films' nearest rival, making its debut at three with £1.5m.

Seasonal release Get Santa was a distant seventh with takings of £576,722.

It was followed by another Christmas film, Nativity 3: Dude Where's My Donkey? which has been in the countdown for four weeks, amassing ticket sales of more than £5m.

But Paddington, a mixture of live action and animation based on Michael Bond's popular books, has now surpassed the £10m mark after just two weeks of business at the cinemas.

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1, starring Jennifer Lawrence, scored the biggest UK debut of the year when it was first released two weeks ago, and has now held onto the second spot for two weeks.

At the other end of the rundown, St Vincent and Black Sea scored new entries, but languished at the foot of the top 10 with relatively meagre takings of £389,136 and £246,309 respectively.