Zach Cregger's Resident Evil gave the North American box office a shot in the arm in its first weekend in theaters. The Sony Pictures release earned $60 million in ticket sales from 3,684 locations in the US and Canada, according to studio estimates Sunday. That's a best for the video game-inspired franchise, of which there have been seven prior movies dating to 2002, and for the filmmaker behind Weapons and Barbarian. It's also more than most of the previous films made in their entire domestic runs, the AP reports. The only exception is Resident Evil: Afterlife, which was released in 2010 and netted out with $60.1 million, not accounting for inflation.
Cregger's Resident Evil stars Austin Abrams as a medical courier whose last job of the night finds him battling infected creatures in Raccoon City. Reviews were overwhelmingly positive; it currently boasts a 95% on Rotten Tomatoes. The audience gave it a B+ CinemaScore. Resident Evil cost a reported $75 million to produce, which does not include marketing and promotion expenses. Internationally, it earned $48.3 million, bringing its global launch to $108.3 million. Second place went to Practical Magic 2, which fell about 59% from its lackluster opening weekend with $12.2 million from 4,163 theaters in North America. An additional $7 million from international showings brings its running global total to $76.8 million. Spider-Man: Brand New Day landed in third place in its eighth weekend.
With final domestic figures being released Monday, this list factors in the estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at US and Canadian theaters, according to Rentrak:
- Resident Evil, $60 million.
- Practical Magic 2, $12.2 million.
- Spider-Man: Brand New Day, $6.5 million.
- The Odyssey, $4.9 million.
- Coyote vs. Acme, $4.5 million.
- Runner, $3.2 million.
- Daniel and the Fiery Furnace, $3.1 million.
- Transformers: The Movie (40th anniversary re-release), $3.1 million.
- The Weight, $2.3 million.
- Buddy, $1.9 million.
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