The weekend looks highly promising for THE CONJURING (Warners), which haunted up $3.3M in screenings that began 7PM on Thursday night. Although other summer openings have had similar mid-$3M starts (including The Great Gatsby and World War Z), the closest analogue here is probably the $3.4M earned by low-budget The Purge in its Thursday start, and that went on a $34.1M weekend. In fact, given the exceptional critical response (84% on Rotten Tomatoes), Conjuring could be the rare horror movie with strong word of mouth, which could raise is prospects even more.
On the other end of the spectrum was R.I.P.D. (Universal), off to a dismal start with $773K on Thursday night. That’s the lowest of the summer, below The Internship, which went on to a $17.3M weekend. Considering that R.I.P.D. cost more than double Internship‘s budget–and Internship was a flop–that’s a lousy sign.
RED 2 also held Thursday night screenings, but Lionsgate is in no hurry to release the numbers.
| TITLE | THURSDAY NIGHT BOX OFFICE | WEEKEND BOX OFFICE | THURS AS % OF WEEKEND |
| IRON MAN 3 | 15.6M | 174.1M | 9% |
| THE GREAT GATSBY | 3.3M | 50.1M | 6.6% |
| STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS | 3.3M (Wed screenings pre-Thurs opening) |
70.2M | 4.7% |
| FAST & FURIOUS 6 | 6.5M | 97.4M | 6.7% |
| THE HANGOVER PART III | 3.1M | 41.7M | 7.4% |
| NOW YOU SEE ME | 1.5M | 29.4M | 5.1% |
| AFTER EARTH | 1M | 27.5M | 3.6% |
| THE PURGE | 3.4M | 34.1M | 10% |
| THE INTERNSHIP | 800K | 17.3M | 4.6% |
| THIS IS THE END | 2.2M (Tues screenings pre -Wed opening) |
20.7 | 10.6% |
| MAN OF STEEL | 12M (Wal-mart sponsored screenings) |
128.6M | 9.3% |
| WORLD WAR Z | 3.6M | 66.4M | 5.4% |
| MONSTERS UNIVERSITY | 2.6M | 82.4M | 3.2% |
| THE HEAT | 1M | 39.1M | 2.5% |
| WHITE HOUSE DOWN | 1.35M | 24.9M | 5.4% |
| DESPICABLE ME 2 | 4.7M (Tues screenings pre-Wed opening) |
83.5M | 5.6% |
| THE LONE RANGER | 2M(Tues screenings pre-Wed opening) | 29.2M | 6.8% |
| PACIFIC RIM | 3.6M | 37.3 | 9.7% |
| GROWN UPS 2 | 2.3M | 41.5 | 5.5% |
| THE CONJURING | 3.3M | ??? | |
| R.I.P.D. | 773K | ??? |
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