Amidst the best critical and audience reception ever received for a film bearing the name of Capcom’s horror video game series, Sony Pictures’ “Resident Evil” has earned a $26.3 million opening day from 3,684 locations, setting a new franchise record.
From this start, Sony is projecting a domestic opening weekend of $53-55 million while industry estimates and theatrical sources are predicting that stronger Saturday and Sunday totals will bring a $60 million weekend. Either result is a career record for director Zach Cregger and a franchise record for “Resident Evil,” passing the $26.6 million mark set by Paul W.S. Anderson’s “Resident Evil: Afterlife” in 2010, which equates roughly to $40.9 million after inflation adjustment.
Through the 2000s, “Resident Evil” at the box office was associated with the Milla Jovovich series of films that made decent money amidst weak reviews. That’s not the case with Cregger’s film, which holds a strong 96% critics and 91% audience Rotten Tomatoes score alongside a B+ on CinemaScore and 4.5/5 on PostTrak.
That word-of-mouth, combined with Cregger’s growing popularity among horror fans, should give “Resident Evil” a chance to leg out well into October and possibly serve as a seasonal Halloween offering for moviegoers even with competition from Universal/Blumhouse’s “Other Mommy” and Warner Bros./DC’s “Clayface” next month.
“Resident Evil” carried a $75 million budget from TriStar Pictures, Constantin Films and Davis Films, with Vertigo Entertainment as a co-producer.
Meanwhile, Warner Bros./Alcon’s “Practical Magic 2” is looking at a steep 65% drop from its $30 million opening weekend, earning an industry estimated $10.4 million second weekend to bring its domestic total to $48.2 million against a $75 million budget. While winning fans of the original “Practical Magic” over, this legacyquel isn’t attracting a significant wider female audience.
With “Resident Evil” providing more than half of all grosses, the overall total for the weekend is set to reach $111 million, up 27% from last weekend and 45% from the same mid-September frame in 2025.
