Awards hopeful “The Imitation Game” exploded at the specialty box office this weekend, averaging $120,000 in four theaters. That's the second-best limited opening of the year, behind only “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” which averaged more than $202,000 in its four-theater debut in March. The Morten Tyldum-directed drama, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Keira Knightley, took in $480,000 from four locations in New York and Los Angeles for the Weinstein Company. Also read: 'Hunger Games: Mockingjay' Fattens Up with $82 Million Thanksgiving Box Office “Imitation Ga

By Chris Maltby The Imitation Game, in its original definition, is a party game. A man and a woman go into separate rooms and then guests attempt to tell them apart by asking a series of questions, and both the man and woman send out a series of answers with the specific intention of convincing the participants that one is actually the other.

Directed by Morten Tyldum (Headhunters) and starring Benedict Cumberbatch as pioneering and unjustly prosecuted computer scientist Alan Turing, The Imitation Game has been squarely established as a key player in this year’s awards race. That means it can be easy to talk about Cumberbatch’s Oscar chances rather than the film itself. But set aside questions about awards for now.

Benedict Cumberbatch and company kick things off in styleThe stars came out and the heavens opened for the opening night of the 58th BFI London Film Festival. Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley and the cast and crew of the opening film, Alan Turing biopic The Imitation Game, walked a sodden red carpet in Leicester Square for the European premiere of the movie.Clare Stewart, director of the LFF, is now in her third year managing both the festival and the expectations that people have of the event.