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Box Office Report: Horror Reigns For Another Weekend, Dominating 2017

By Nick Younker
Published on: 11:23 PST, Feb 26, 2017

Horror movies have been dominating the early 2017 box office with a plethora of fan favorites and originals coming out in theaters with tremendous word of mouth to drive repeat and new customers on subsequent days. This week, it was Jordan Peele’s Get Out that put the finishing touches on a commanding weekend.

For those who are unaware, Jordan Peele is the highly-acclaimed comedy actor from the hit TV show, Key & Peele, as reported by Deadline. The duo broke new ground with their hit show in comedy, but Jordan Peele always had a love for horror movies and his decision to make his directorial debut after his show ended has only catapulted his reputation as a hit maker with serious talent on and off the screen.

In the official box office report from Box Office Mojo, the horror genre has claimed some new victims in 2017 on its way to the top. Jordan Peele’s Get Out has officially come back with a $30.5 million estimated return at the box office for the weekend, and it’s for good reason.

According to review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, Jordan Peele’s Get Out was more than just a hit with audiences. Get Out scored 100 percent from its reviews, earning it a coveted title within the movie industry that few have matched. It also had an 88 percent score with audiences, which also indicates that word of mouth has been a major driving factor for its success, and horror fans can be on the lookout for a repeat performance next weekend at the box office, although it is unlikely to be No. 1 against the highly-anticipated X-Men spinoff, Logan, that premieres on March 3.

But Get Out is not the only horror movie that has been making bank at the box office. M. Night Shyamalan has also returned to his glory days of box office success with his hit film, Split. Although it was edged out of the No. 1 slot at the box office over two weeks ago, it spent its first three consecutive weeks at No. 1 and cashed in at $221 million worldwide (and still growing).

Sticking with the horror genre at the box office, the fifth installment of the vampire vs. werewolf franchise, Underworld: Blood Wars debuted on January 6 at No. 4 on the box office list with $13 million, but it stopped its box office run last weekend after banking nearly $80 million worldwide. That’s not bad for a horror film on a $35 million budget.

Rings debuted at No. 2 behind Split on its opening weekend, but it had a bit of a tough go at it following the initial opening. It pulled in $13 million at the box office in the opening weekend, but fell quickly and has only ended up with $27 million thus far. It does not appear to be rising much higher than that, but the worldwide draw has been sufficient to cover the budget and then some with a total box office haul of $74 million.

At the domestic box office, the final Resident Evil film was met with lackluster returns at the box office, totaling around $26 million. It did not play last weekend and seems to have been mostly pulled from the active domestic roster. That might also be because the overseas haul has been dramatically high, pulling in over $212 million for a worldwide box office total of $238 million thus far.

Audiences loved the Resident Evil franchise in the beginning, but it started losing a lot of its mojo once the later sequels started taking shape.

In all, horror at the box office this year has been a well-rounded success thanks to films like Get Out, Split and Resident Evil. It also seems as though the future is only getting brighter for horror films in the mainstream now that the genre has been performing so well on TV with shows like The Walking Dead and American Horror Story.

[Featured Image by Universal]

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