Things are getting eerie in the box office, as The Conjuring franchises latest installment, The Nun, scared up a whopping $54 million at the U.S. box office over the past weekend. Horror films are notorious for raking in meager amounts of money due to their low production costs and niche audiences, but the Nun shocked the world when it broke its expected $40 million pull-in and doubled its $22 million budget.
Since The Conjuring first debuted in 2013, the franchise has made hundreds of millions. But The Nun had something special going for it, as it broke the previous record for highest opening for all movies in the franchise. Previously, the original Conjuring film held the title of highest opening weekend gross with $41.9 million. The Nun cleared that by over $10 million, so now it reigns supreme for the best opening weekend in the franchise.
The thing that shocked most analysts was its ability to dethrone Crazy Rich Asians which has been dominating the box office for the past three weekends in a row. Its not every weekend that a horror film can knock a romantic comedy off of the top spot, but the Corin Hardey film did it expertly.
