Once upon a time, the Halloween box office belonged to Freddy Krueger. Now it belongs to Freddy Fazbear, as Universal/Blumhouse’s “Five Nights at Freddy’s” is on pace to set a new studio record for Blumhouse with a $78 million opening.
If that figure holds, it will pass the previous Blumhouse record of $76.2 million set in 2018 by the revival of “Halloween.” Even if Saturday and Sunday numbers slip, it is set to more than double the record for the highest weekend total posted by a film on Halloween weekend, a record that previously belonged to “Saw III” with $33 million in 2006.
The adaptation of Scott Cawthon’s indie horror video game series also passed the record for the highest opening weekend set by a film released simultaneously on home platforms, topping the $49 million opening of fellow Blumhouse film “Halloween Kills” in 2021. Like that film, “Five Nights” was released day-and-date on Peacock, but fans of Freddy have shown up in huge numbers to see the new film in theaters.
There’s a good chance that, like “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour” earlier this month, “Five Nights at Freddy’s” will have a frontloaded box office run given its availability on streaming and its unlikeliness to find an audience beyond fans of its source material. But those fans are more than pleased with the film, giving it an A- on CinemaScore.
Speaking of “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour,” that concert film is set to take the No. 2 spot on the charts with $15 million in its third weekend, passing the $150 million mark domestically. In doing so, “The Eras Tour” has passed the domestic run of “Fast X,” which made $145 million this past summer.
Paramount/Apple’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” is in third with an estimated $10 million in its second weekend, representing a decent 57% drop from its $23 million opening weekend.
With a cume of $41.6 million domestically, Martin Scorsese’s acclaimed historical drama isn’t going to make back its $200 million-plus budget before marketing from this theatrical run, and we won’t know for months whether the film drew enough eyes to Apple TV+ to be deemed a sufficient return on investment for the Silicon Valley streamer.
