That significant international haul has pushed the entire franchise to around $994 mil lifetime worldwide total (though Sony is claiming it has already passed $1 bil). These films have always been solid international players and Final Chapter is no exception, earning $64.5 mil so far overseas including a whopping $33.8 mil in Japan. However the franchise has never been a major domestic player, with the highest grossing entry Afterlife only earning $60.1 mil domestic. That's even lower than the first Resident Evil, which opened in 2002 to $17.7 mil. Perhaps it may in fact be the final entry as Resident Evil: The Final Chapter had the worst domestic opening of the franchise, opening at #4 with $13.8 mil. Helps the film scored an A on Cinemascore, and while the lower opening may have kept it from the possible $100 mil high bar Universal was probably hoping for, the film is probably looking at a $60 mil domestic haul when all is said and done. While marketing for the film has been huge, they should probably end up making back the film's budget and marketing when all is said and done. While $18.3 mil is on the low end of expectations (Universal was hoping for somewhere around $25 mil) it's still a pretty solid opening for a film that cost only $22 mil. However either the issues with the video I mentioned or the fact it just didn't reach many people has shown that despite the PETA protests the film ended up doing well. Whether it was the leaker or TMZ's intention to do so, the timing of the video was very clearly intended to destroy the box office receipts of this film as the footage was taken in 2015 but only released last week. The video itself has been controversial, with groups like PETA saying it shows obvious mistreatment of animals while those involved with the film note that the video was edited to make it look worse than it was. For those unaware a week or so ago a video was leaked by TMZ that showed a German Shepard seemingly being scared and forced to do a water stunt.
The other and more surprising one is A Dog's Purpose, which opened at #2 with $18.3 mil. First was Split, which has been criticized a lot for its portrayal of mental illness and sexual abuse.
This week saw two Universal films overcome controversy and succeed. I really do think Shyamalan has tapped back into the audience he lost many years ago.
Quite frankly horror films sold on an original premise don't perform like this. It will be very interesting to see how Split will do against direct competition against the horror franchise entry Rings next weekend, but already it has been an amazing success for Shyamalan. While Split isn't performing at the same domestic hold level as The Sixth Sense (though let's face it, we'll probably never see a hold like that again) it's definitely performing at the level of Signs and way better than The Village. Don't Breathe was considered to have some of the best domestic legs ever for a horror film and it dropped 40% on it's second weekend. Last year's Conjuring 2 also opened to $40 mil but drop 63% for it's second weekend. It needs to be stated just how incredible this weekend drop is for a horror film. This already puts the film past Shyamalan's previous film The Visit for total domestic gross in just two weeks and puts it just under The Purge: Election Year as the 6th highest grossing Blumhouse release. Night has found those magic domestic legs he once had in his heyday as Split once again defied expectations dropping only 34%, remaining at #1 for the second weekend in a row with $26.2 mil.
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