The well-reviewed teen horror film “It Follows” will get its widest run yet this weekend, with distributor Radius-Dimension saying Tuesday that it will expand to 1,655 theaters on Friday.
The R-rated chiller cracked the top five at the box office in its first major expansion last weekend, when it took in $3.8 million on 1,218 screens. That’s a solid $3,129 per-location average for the film, which had a production budget under $2 million and has grossed $4.5 million after three weekends in release.
Radius brass opted to go with a wider box-office run for “It Follows,” rather than the video-on-demand strategy they typically employ for their mainly art-house releases, after its strong limited debut. It averaged $40,000 in four theaters when it opened on the March 13-15 weekend.
“It Follows” was written and directed by David Robert Mitchell and features an ensemble cast topped by Maika Monroe. She plays a 19-year-old who, after a seemingly innocent sexual encounter, suddenly finds herself plagued by nightmarish visions. The critics have it at 95 percent positive on Rotten Tomatoes.