Box office: ‘The Exorcist: Believer’ underperforms with estimated $27 million

Edward Douglas
·5 min read
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Despite the amount of horror movies released in September, October seemed like a better time for the genre to get a bump with the latest attempt to revive a horror classic. That wasn’t really the case. Read on for the weekend box office report.

There were indeed some hopes that the David Gordon Green-directed “The Exorcist: Believer” would be the good start for a new trilogy based on the William Friedkin-directed 1973 adaptation of William Peter Blatty’s novel, a major theatrical blockbuster at the time that became a horror classic. Green even brought back Ellen Burstyn from the original movie, joining Leslie Odom Jr., Ann Dowd and Jennifer Nettles, as a continuation of Friedkin’s film.

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Despite anticipation for another solid “requel” ala Green’s 2018 “Halloween,” “Believer” was universally panned by critics with an awful 23% on Rotten Tomatoes ahead of its release into 3,663 theaters by Universal. It ended up making $2.8 million in Thursday previews and $11.9 million on Friday, including those previews. Ultimately, it ended up grossing an estimated $27.2 million over the weekend, which is a bigger opening than last weekend’s “Saw X” but lower than “The Nun II” last month.  It’s also considerably lower than the $76.2 million opening for “Halloween,” which the studio may have been striving for when it shelled out $400 million for the rights to the property.

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On top of that, the movie received a “C” on CinemaScore from audiences, which means it’s likely to plummet off a cliff next weekend. “Believer” did bring in $17.9 million from overseas markets with $4 million of that coming from Mexico, but Universal may start deciding whether it wants to keep the April 2025 release date for a sequel or just send any future installments to streamer Peacock.

Paramount’s “PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie” fell more than expected to second place with $11.8 million, down 48% but bringing its domestic total to $38.9 million.

Another R-rated horror sequel, “Saw X,” dropped to third place with $8.2 million, down 55% from its own opening weekend, to bring its total to $32.3 million.

Gareth Edwards’ sci-fi film “The Creator” fell to fourth place with $6.1 million, down 57%, more than the other two new releases from last weekend, as it has grossed less than $25 million so far. “The Creator” is doing slightly better internationally, adding another $10.8 million for an overseas total of $37 million.

SEE Box office: All time domestic top-grossing movies

“The Blind,” the biopic about the founder of “Duck Dynasty,” seems to be another hit for Fathom Events, making another $3.1 million (down 28%) to bring its total to $10.5 million.

Kenneth Branagh’s “A Haunting in Venice” finally pulled ahead of the Warners horror sequel, “The Nun II,” with $2.7 million (down 25%) for sixth place to the latter’s $2.6 million (down 46%). “The Nun II” is still well ahead in terms of overall box office with $81 million to “Venice’s” $35.6 million.

Two Sony movies followed in eighth and ninth place, with the stock market comedy “Dumb Money” making $2.1 million (down 35%), and the Denzel Washington action sequel “The Equalizer 3” following with $1.8 million and the latter being far ahead of most of the fall releases with $88.8 million.

Disney gave a 30th anniversary re-release of the 1993 family comedy “Hocus Pocus” into 1,430 theaters to take advantage of the lack of new releases, a strategy that worked, as it broke into the Top 10 with $1.5 million for the weekend or $1,078 per theater.

Of the abundant amount of limited releases hitting theaters on Friday, A24’s “Dicks: The Musical,” directed by Larry Charles (“Borat”), fared the best by making $220,900 in seven theaters in New York, L.A. and San Fran, averaging $31,552 per location. The plans are to expand it nationwide on October 20.

Rebecca Miller‘s “She Came to Me” and Kitty Green‘s “The Royal Hotel,” which opened in 355 and 267 theaters respectively, each ended up in the mid-$300k region, averaging about $1,000 per location. Pedro Almodóvar‘s short film “Strange Way of Life” was released into 276 theaters on Friday but only ended up with $205,000.

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IFC Films’ Spanish-language horror film “When Evil Lurks” just didn’t stand a chance opening against “The Exorcist,” and its release into 659 theaters barely made as much as the Almodóvar in half as many theaters.

Monday is Indigenous Peoples’ Day, so we’ll have to see if that affects the Sunday or weekend numbers once estimates come in on Monday, but the Top 10 this weekend was back down from last weekend.

Once again, “The Blind” is a major spoiler for the box office prediction game. Originally planned as a short-term Fathom Event, it’s been kept in theaters and made enough money this past weekend to remain in fifth place with only 15 players picking “None of these.” The majority of players got the rest of the top five correctly although second and third place were split fairly evenly between “PAW Patrol” and “Saw X.”

No player went 6 for 6 in the Sept. 28 box office game, many tripped up by the new releases, including “The Blind,” but “jeseminx” did get five other placements correct, and would have received more points with even a single Super Bet.

On Friday, the Taylor Swift concert film, “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour,” will be released into 4,000 theaters, so check back on Wednesday for a preview of its box office.

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