Weekend Box Office: ‘Ouija’ Spooks With Top Spot

Halloween is clearly on everyone’s minds because Ouija topped the box office this weekend. Surprisingly, Brad Pitt’s Fury couldn’t top the box office for the second week. Instead, a film that wasn’t promoted nearly as much used the holiday spirit to make its box office debut in the top spot.

So how much money did Ouija make? The Halloween entry racked up $20 million, which is huge considering it was made on a $5 million budget. For those who aren’t familiar, Ouija is based on a group of friends utilizing the board game as a way to investigate a friend’s sudden death. What the friends come to realize is that they have unleashed deadly consequences.

Although it managed to grab the top box office, critics were lukewarm about the film, which seems to be the trend with most Halloween releases these days. Entertainment Weekly had this to say about Ouija.

“Within the pungent field of other wide-release scare jobs and films derived from cardboard-based time-killers for kids, Ouija stacks up relatively well, thanks to its look and a confident performance by Cooke. That said, it’s still best left on the shelf.”

Pitt’s Fury was nowhere to be found in the top two spots. Surprisingly it was Keanu Reeves’ John Wick which made an impressive debut with $14 million. Finally, Fury dropped two spots to the third spot with $13 million.

As The Inquistir reported, John Wick did fairly well with critics, which has to make Reeves happy, seeing as this is his return to the box office in some time. The SF Gate highlighted Reeves’ impressive turns in The Matrix series as a jumping off point for his return with John Wick.

“Mr. ‘Matrix’ is right at the top of that meat mountain, but with a style all his own. His dancelike precision is almost beautiful as he crushes someone’s windpipe, breaks his elbow and blows his brains out. Reeves’ skills are on glorious display in ‘John Wick,’ an expertly made revenge drama in which he goes all headshot on lots and lots of bad guys, and it’s awesome.”

Rounding out the box office in the top ten is Gone Girl at No. 4 with $11 million, The Book of Life with $9.8 million, St. Vincent with $8 million, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day with $7 million, The Best of Me with $4 million, The Judge with $4 million, and Dracula Untold with $4.3 million.

[Image via Universal]