In an unexpected turn of events, the low-budget slasher film “Terrifier 3” earned more at the box office this weekend than the highly promoted sequel “Joker: Folie à Deux.” “Terrifier 3” brought in $18.3 million from showings in over 2,500 theaters nationwide. This far surpassed projections for the $2.5 million production and marks the film’s biggest performance to date.
In contrast, “Joker: Folie à Deux” saw ticket sales drop sharply in its second week. The follow-up to 2019’s billion-dollar hit “Joker” only made around $6.8 to $7 million. That’s an enormous 81% to 82% decline from its first weekend take of over $30 million. Analysts noted this breaks the record for the steepest second-week drop for such a widely released film.
Industry experts suggest word-of-mouth helped drive interest in “Terrifier 3” among horror fans willing to see its graphic violence. However, poor reviews and lack of enthusiasm have hurt “Joker: Folie à Deux” despite top stars like Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga. Audiences gave it CinemaScore’s worst rating ever for a comic book movie. With a $200 million production and marketing budget including $20 million salaries each for Phoenix and director Todd Phillips, profit looks doubtful.
In other box office developments, the animated film “The Wild Robot” from Universal continued performing well. Ticket sales dipped only 29% in its third weekend, bringing in $13.5 million. DreamWorks was so pleased it has greenlit a sequel. Warner Bros. also found modest success with “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice,” which added $7.1 million in its sixth week. Documentary “Piece By Piece” and comedy “Saturday Night” had respective openings of around $3.8 million and $3.5 million.
As the dust settles on this unexpected race, it’s clear big budgets don’t always lead to big returns. “Terrifier 3’s” success over “Joker: Folie à Deux” shows audience tastes are hard to predict and smaller, targeted films still have potential for major returns.
