'Us' nabs a $71.1 million opening weekend, one of the best ever for a horror movie
Jordan Peele's Us is already making history.
The 2017 adaptation of Stephen King's It enjoyed a $123.4 million opening weekend in U.S. theaters. Halloween, the 2018 sequel to the '70s horror classic, grabbed $76.2 million.
Those two movies account for the horror genre's best and second-best domestic opening weekends, respectively, in Hollywood history. Us, which released on Friday, March 22, earned $71.1 million in the U.S. between Friday and Sunday.
If you're a fan of horror, you've also probably realized by now that the stellar opening weekend for Us is the genre's best ever for an original story (as opposed to an adaptation, sequel, or remake). Like I said, history.
Us is also notably on track to record the second-biggest opening weekend of 2019. Only Captain Marvel is ahead of it, with a $153.4 million opening weekend. For now, at least. Us is likely to slide down this particular chart as new Avengers and Star Wars movies surface in 2019, not to mention Disney's busy slate of live-action remakes (Aladdin, Dumbo, and The Lion King will all be out before 2020).
Peele's opening weekend success isn't exactly surprising.. Us has been a critical darling, and it currently holds a 94 percent "Fresh" rating on the review aggregation site, Rotten Tomatoes. The audience rating of 69 percent "Fresh" (nice) is a good bit lower, but still relatively high for a stat that can be gamed so easily.
This is also the second feature effort for Peele after his breakout 2017 hit, Get Out. That earlier film enjoyed a considerably smaller $33.7 million haul during its opening weekend, but it went on to gross more than $176 million in total, the third highest among R-rated horror movies.
Peele is much more of a known quantity as Us hits theaters, and some of the immediate opening success is no doubt propelled by the legacy of Get Out. But with his CBS-grown reboot of The Twilight Zone series almost here and an Us cast that features some of the biggest stars of the moment -- Lupita Nyong'o and Winston Duke from Black Panther, as well The Handmaid's Tale's Elisabeth Moss -- everything seems to be working in favor of the box office prospects for Us.
All box office data provided by comScore and Box Office Mojo.
UPDATE: March 24, 2019, 12:58 p.m. EDT An earlier version of this story erroneously stated that Jordan Peele's reboot of 'The Twilight Zone' is a Netflix production. It's actually a CBS production, bound for CBS All Access. We apologize for the error.
Topics Film
Adam Rosenberg is a Senior Games Reporter for Mashable, where he plays all the games. Every single one. From AAA blockbusters to indie darlings to mobile favorites and browser-based oddities, he consumes as much as he can, whenever he can.Adam brings more than a decade of experience working in the space to the Mashable Games team. He previously headed up all games coverage at Digital Trends, and prior to that was a long-time, full-time freelancer, writing for a diverse lineup of outlets that includes Rolling Stone, MTV, G4, Joystiq, IGN, Official Xbox Magazine, EGM, 1UP, UGO and others.Born and raised in the beautiful suburbs of New York, Adam has spent his life in and around the city. He's a New York University graduate with a double major in Journalism and Cinema Studios. He's also a certified audio engineer. Currently, Adam resides in Crown Heights with his dog and his partner's two cats. He's a lover of fine food, adorable animals, video games, all things geeky and shiny gadgets.
