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Ryan Coogler’s Southern Gothic horror film Sinners is performing strong legs at the box office, raking in $13 million on its second Friday. That positions the movie to take in an estimated $42 million second weekend, an 8% drop from its $48 million opening. That’s a performance that’s out of character for a genre defined by steep second-weekend falls.
Sinners, in which Michael B. Jordan plays opposite himself as twin brothers battling an evil presence in 1932 Mississippi, has won over audiences and critics alike — it boasts a near-perfect 98% on Rotten Tomatoes and an “A” CinemaScore, a virtually unprecedented feat for a horror film. With its budget estimated at $90–100 million, Sinners has already taken in a reported $121.7 million worldwide at the box office, according to box office trackers.
Meanwhile, Ben Affleck’s The Accountant 2 opened on Friday with $9.4 million, including Thursday night previews. The action-thriller follow-up is directed once more by Gavin O’Connor and features back its star Christian Wolff, the autistic forensic accountant with a deadly set of skills. It earned its first mixed reviews in March, showing at SXSW before opening nationwide. It anticipates an opening weekend of $24–26 million — a solid but unremarkable start.
Affleck is joined by Jon Bernthal and Cynthia Addai-Robinson, reprising his role as Wolff’s brother. Although the original Accountant of 2016 opened bigger ($24.7 million) without a franchise name to help, the sequel’s performance will most likely be gauged on its legs in future weeks, especially as it leads up to a healthy digital and streaming run.
And let’s not forget: Disney’s 20th-anniversary reissue of Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith made $11.3 million on Friday alone. The reissue is riding a wave of nostalgia and is headed for a $20 million-plus weekend — another proof that people are more than happy to watch vintage blockbuster material on the big screen.
For the moment, Sinners is still the reigning champion, with solid word-of-mouth indicating that it has the potential to be one of the top-grossing original fright flicks of the decade. Coogler’s compelling storytelling and Jordan’s star power have made what could have been a fringe project into an all-out phenomenon. Meanwhile, The Accountant 2 can try to gain traction, but it has its work cut out for it going into May.
