The fall movie season started off with a bang this weekend, as The Nun blasted past expectations to debut with an estimated $53.5 million in its opening frame. Elsewhere, Peppermint had an okay debut in third place while fellow newcomer God Bless the Broken Road barely registered with a weaker-than-expected opening.
Following four previous films in what is now being referred to as the Conjuring universe, The Nun successfully set a new opening record for the franchise, easily besting the first Conjuring‘s $41.8 million debut back in 2013. It didn’t hurt that the Warner Bros. title enjoyed the widest release of any of the previous Conjuring and Conjuring-adjacent films, debuting in a whopping 3,876 locations for a sizzling per-screen average of $13,803. Its weekend cume includes $4.5 million from over 400 IMAX locations, whose elevated ticket prices helped boost its overall total.
While far from the nearly-untouchable $123.4 million opening weekend of It last year, The Nun‘s total this weekend nevertheless stands as the second-highest September debut of all time. It was helped along by a memorable trailer (which boasted the highest recall of any trailer last week, according to our metrics) and a relative dearth of top-tier horror releases as of late, which ramped up anticipation among genre fans.
While fans certainly turned out for opening weekend, it remains to be seen how front-loaded The Nun will prove to be. For one thing, it garnered a not-great “C” Cinemascore from opening day audiences – by far the lowest of the franchise – and its Rotten Tomatoes score currently stands at a fairly dismal 29%. That’s the same percentage garnered by the first Annabelle, which also happens to have the lowest weekend-to-final multiplier of any film in the series with 2.2x ($37.1 million opening, $84.2 million total). Should The Nun follow a similar trajectory, it would finish somewhere in the neighborhood of $110-120 million when all is said and done, though of course it’s too early to tell how subsequent weekends will play out.
Notably, this is the fifth consecutive weekend that Warner Bros. has had the No. 1 movie in North America, following the three-weekend run of Crazy Rich Asians and the opening weekend of The Meg before that. It’s also the fourth consecutive weekend the studio has had both the No. 1 and No. 2 films domestically, which they note hasn’t happened in over 25 years. That could change, of course, if Crazy Rich Asians is knocked from its No.2 perch by Peppermint once actuals come in, as estimates for the two titles currently have them about $400K apart.
Dropping to second place after a spectacular three weekend run at the top of the chart is Crazy Rich Asians, which dipped 37% to $13.6 million in its fourth weekend release. The Warner Bros. smash now boasts an incredible $136.2 million to date, which already makes it one of the highest-grossing romantic comedies of all time. If it continues at its current pace, it could well end up in the $200 million range, rivaling the No. 1 rom-com of all time, 2002’s My Big Fat Greek Wedding ($241.4 million total).
Third place went to revenge thriller Peppermint, which took in a decent $13.2 million in its opening frame. Among similar titles, that’s about in line with this year’s Death Wish remake, which debuted to $13 million back in March. Meanwhile, it came in slightly below the $14.4 million John Wick opened to back in 2014 and considerably under the $17.6 million opening of the Gabrielle Union thriller Breaking In from earlier this year. The opening weekend audience for Peppermint was 56% female.
The smart money has Peppermint performing just about in line with Death Wish, which had a similarly-dreary Rotten Tomatoes average (Peppermint currently sits at just 13%) and an identical “B+” Cinemascore and ultimately finished with $34 million in North America. A glut of similar fare as of late, including last month’s The Equalizer 2, could have put a damper on this one’s prospects. According to some reports, the budget for Peppermint is in the mid-$20 million range.
In fourth place, The Meg continued its stellar run with another $6 million in weekend number five, giving the giant-shark thriller a total of $131.5 million to date and nearly three times as much overseas. In fifth, Sony/Screen Gems’ Searching brought in an estimated $4.5 million after adding over 800 screens in its second weekend of wide release and third weekend overall. The additional locations allowed the John Cho thriller to ease just 25 percent from last weekend, giving it a total of $14.3 million to date.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout fell out of the Top 5 for the first time this weekend, taking sixth place with $3.8 million in its seventh frame. With $212.1 million in the bank, the Tom Cruise actioner is now within striking distance of toppling Mission Impossible II as the highest-grossing entry in the franchise to date and should do so by next weekend.
In seventh place, Disney’s Christopher Robin added an estimated $3.1 million in its sixth weekend, giving the family release $91.7 million to date and bringing it closer to the $100 million milestone. If it does hit cross that threshold, it would become the seventh Disney title to do so this year.
Eighth place went to Operation Finale, which took in an estimated $3 million in its second weekend. The MGM release dipped 49 percent from its $6 million three-day debut over Labor Day. It now has $14.1 million after 12 days.
Rounding out the Top 10 are BlacKkKlansman and Alpha, which grossed an estimated $2.6 million and $2.5 million in ninth and tenth place, respectively. Alpha‘s total now stands at $32,4 million and BlacKkKlansman has $43.5 million, making it the third-highest-grossing film from Spike Lee not adjusting for inflation.
Debuting even lower than expected outside the Top 10 is Freestyle Releasing’s God Bless the Broken Road, which took in an estimated $1.5 million in 1,272 locations, landing it in 11th place. That’s a far cry from the $17.1 million debut of I Can Only Imagine, another Christian-themed drama based on a hit song that finished its North American run with a spectacular $83.4 million earlier this year.
Limited Release:
Buoyed by strong reviews for stars Glenn Close and Jonathan Pryce, The Wife expanded to 153 screens this weekend and took in an estimated $712,970, giving it a per-screen average of $4,660. Its domestic total is currently $2 million after four weeks of limited release.
Overseas Update:
The Nun took in an estimated $77.5 million in 60 overseas markets, bringing its global opening weekend tally to a scorching $131 million. Totals include $10.7 million in Mexico, $6.8 million in Brazil, $7.7 million in Indonesia, and $5.2 million in the U.K.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout brought in an estimated $38.6 million internationally this weekend (including $32.4 million in its second weekend of release in China), bringing its international cume to $514.5 million. The sixth film in the long-running franchise now has a fantastic worldwide total of $726.6 million, making it the highest-grossing M:I film globally by a long shot.
The post Studio Weekend Estimates: ‘The Nun’ Posts ‘Conjuring’ Franchise Record with $53.5M; ‘Peppermint’ Hunts Down $13.2M appeared first on BoxOffice Pro.
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