The box office might be struggling this year, but the horror genre is alive and well.
This weekend at the US box office, the Groundhog Day-like horror pic Happy Death Day scored a first-place finish, surpassing expectations and blowing the much costlier and star-driven Blade Runner 2049 out of the water.
The horror movie, which is set to release on October 26 in UAE cinemas, raked in $26.5 million (Dh97.3 million) from 3,149 North American theatres. With a $5 million production price tag, Happy Death Day is already a hit.
It’s the latest success story from Blumhouse Productions, which earlier this year released Split and Get Out, with the help of Universal Pictures, which distributed.
Jim Orr, executive vice president of North American distribution for Universal, said Happy Death Day is an original film that’s reimaging the genre.
“It’s as much thriller as it is horror film. It’s scary, it’s funny, and it has an extraordinarily clever script that is very well executed,” Orr said. “Blumhouse owns this space no doubt about it, and they do this better than anybody consistently.”
The film also had the benefit of coming on the heels of the massive success of It, which has earned $314.9 million in the US to date.
One film that does not look destined for a happy ending is Blade Runner 2049, which fell 54 per cent in its second weekend in theatres, adding $15.1 million to bring its North American total to $60.6 million.
The film was a costly endeavour with a production price tag north of $150 million and was well-reviewed by critics. But it couldn’t manage to draw in significant audiences beyond the fans of the 1982 original, which was also a flop upon release.
