By Chris Kavan - 10/28/18 at 08:36 PM CT
It was no surprise that Halloween took the top spot for the second week in a row as audiences are definitely in the horror spirit. None of the new entries really has much of an impact as Gerard Butler's Hunter Killer barely managed to crack the top five while Indivisible landed well outside the top 10. In other horror news, Suspira, an art-house horror film if there was ever one, managed to snag the beast per-theater average of 2018 from just a pair of theaters. Still, it means the weekend has helped October reach $785 million - the biggest October on record - and we still have three days left (including Halloween itself) to get through.
1) HALLOWEEN
After an impressive opening, Halloween dipped 58% to reel in $32 million, bumping the horror film up to $126.7 million total. That means it has surpassed the total for Scream ($103 million) to become the highest-grossing "slasher" film to date. That second-week drop is also in lie with Annabelle (57%) as well as better than the second-week drop for Rob Zombie's Halloween (64%) and its sequel (65%) while coming in just behind H20 (47%). Still, that's a good sign, though we'll have to see how it does once Halloween runs its course and November brings in better competition. But on a $10 million budget, the film is going to do just fine. In fact, it still looks like it will give Give Out ($175 million) a run for its money for biggest Blumhouse domestic hit. It will certainly pass at least Split ($138 million) for second. It will also shortly pass The Ring ($129 million) to become the biggest outright October horror film on record (unless you count Gravity at $274 million). Oh, and it took in $25.6 million to also top the international box office as well, giving it a a grand global total of $253 million. I guess 25x your budget is a pretty good result.
2)
A STAR IS BORN
Also little surprise that our second-place film is still A Star is Born. Bradley Cooper and Lady Gage have made this depressing romance remake another October hit, raking in $14.1 million and a new total of $148.7 million with $150 million likely in the next couple of days or so. That is a mere 26% drop as it continues to play strong with adult audiences. As far as musicals go, A Star is Born will soon top La La Land ($151 million) as it makes a run for The Greatest Showman ($174 million) likely on its way to a $200 million plus final tally. It has also topped the $100 million mark overseas as the Oscar hopeful has already topped $253 million worldwide. And all this on a $36 million budget - so along with Halloween, it's one of the biggest October winners.
3)
VENOM
If that's not enough box office deja vu - Venom also repeated in its third place position, dipping just over 40% to bring in $10.8 million and giving it a new total of $187.28 million - also well on its way to hitting that $200 million domestic total. Venom has also topped $500 million on the global front, with $17.3 million for the weekend and a new $508.4 million total. Even though it wasn't a hit with critics, it should wind up one of the more profitable Spider-Man films to date (in terms of cost to gross). At $100 million, Venom is a steal of a superhero (or villain in this case) film. I have a feeling it's going to hang around for a few more weeks without much issue and we'll see how much its China debut on November 9th helps its bottom line.
4)
GOOSEBUMPS 2: HAUNTED HALLOWEEN
No, I swear, this is a new box office update, even if the top four films are exactly the same as last weekend. Goosebumps 2 dropped under 23% and added $7.5 million to its total, which now stands at $38.3 million. It still looks like this one will be able to at least top that $50 million mark and, with $63.5 million global total, the $35 million film should wind up in the black - though one hopes that if a third entry rolls around a certain Jack Black better have a more prominent part once again (and maybe bring back a few more familiar faces). We'll see if this gets a bit of a Halloween bump as well, but it should wind up doing well enough.
5)
HUNTER KILLER
Alright - our lone new movie to crack the top five, Gerard Butler and Gary Oldman's submarine thriller opened with $6.65 million. That sounds about right for a subdued action film released at the end of October. It did manage an "A-" Cinemascore, though I doubt that will lead to a bigger audience down the road. This one is destined to shine more on home viewing anyway, and it will be a blip on the 2018 box office radar. It's just a bit too generic to stand out, especially with all the films out right now, and doesn't have a lot going for it. I expect it to exit theaters in short order.
Outside the top five: Mid90s, the directorial debut from Jonah Hill, actually expanded to wide release and cracked the top 10 with a $3 million performance (up over 1062% after adding 1202 theaters from 4 last week). It has made $3.35 million so far - not bad at all for this type of film.
The faith-based Indivisible fell well outside the top 10, landing in 13th place with $1.575 million - about what I was expecting.
Johnny English Strikes Again was released in just under 600 theaters (544 to be exact) so wasn't technically a wide release. It beat Indivisible to land in 12th place with $1.62 million. It won't have much of an impact stateside, but had done much better worldwide, $107 million and counting, and thus America really doesn't matter much at this point.
The big winner in limited release was easily Suspiria. the more re-imagined than remake of the classic giallo from Dario Argento. Playing in just two theaters, the film brought in $$179,806 (22nd place) for a 2018 best $89,903 per-theater average. This one is going to expand a bit more in the coming weeks, so we'll see if this arthouse horror (starring Dakota Johnson, Tilda Swinton and Chloë Grace Moretz among others) can continue to grow as well.
Next week as we usher in November, Rami Malek channels Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody, Disney delivers The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, we get the Tiffany Haddish comedy Nobody's Fool and Steve Carell teams with Timothée Chalamet in the very dramatic Beautiful Boy.
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