Certified fresh by Rotten Tomatoes, the New Line and Warner Bros-led remake of the Stephen King classic, It, has seemingly brought the domestic box office back to life with a $51 million dollar opening night domestically from 4,103 theaters.
This comes off of the heels of seven straight weeks of poor movie attendance, reaching a 25-year low, as well as the worst summer in recent theater memory. It has shattered numerous records, most notably breaking the record for the biggest start ever for a horror film without counting for inflation, according to The Hollywood Reporter. In addition, the movie’s Friday night take has unseated Hotel Transylvania 2 for the biggest opening weekend take for September, which pulled in $48.5 million for its opening weekend.
It also surpassed Deadpool‘s Preview night and Friday night takes with $15.3 million coming in on Thursday compared to Deadpool’s $12.7 million. To put things into consideration for Friday, Deadpool amassed $47 million on its opening Friday. With this in consideration, it officially holds the record for biggest preview night and opening night for an R-rated movie. In terms of all movies, only Guardians of the Galaxy 2 holds a higher preview night record with a $17.2 million gate,
Internationally, the film opened with a $16.1 million across 10,560 screens, bringing the gate from overseas markets to $25.7 million. It had a budget of$35 million, and not accounting for overseas while accounting for the projections set in place for the domestic weekend gate, It is on pace to be not only a critical success but also a financial one for New Line and Warner Bros. Studios.
