We told you last week that ‘The Nun‘ was set up for a $45 million opening weekend. We also told you that if it reached that number, it’d be a record for ‘The Conjuring’ franchise.
Well, we’re happy to report that the horror flick took home an impressive $53.5 million this past weekend, which means it broke the opening weekend record for the franchise by a cool $12 million.
The $53.5 million total is the second-best September debut behind Warner Bros’. It. The Nun also opened overseas and made an additional $77.5 million, bringing its total to $131 million.
This is a huge win for the studio because this movie worked with a budget of just $22 million. This is why every studio in Hollywood wants a successful horror franchise. They are cheap to make and have the chance to make a lot of $$$ at the box office.
Jeff Goldstein, Warner Bros. head of domestic distribution, told Variety…
“We knew heading into the weekend that anticipation for ‘The Nun’ was extremely high across multiple demos, but these results surpassed all our expectations. We anticipate strong word of mouth to carry the film well into the fall.”
By the way, it’s doing all this with virtually zero support from critics. It has a 27% on Rotten Tomatoes.