Will “The Black Phone 2” end Blumhouse’s downtrodden box office streak?
The horror sequel, again starring Ethan Hawke as the serial killer known as the Grabber, is targeting a debut of $23 to $29 million from 3,200 North American theaters. Since pre-release tracking has wildly missed the mark in recent weeks, studio sources are conservatively suggesting an $18 million opening weekend. Universal is distributing the $30 million-budgeted film. Though a wide range, projections are similar to the first “Black Phone,” which opened to $23 million in 2021 as theaters were just starting to recover from COVID. That film became a breakout hit with $161 million globally.
Blumhouse could use a win on that scale. The horror empire behind scary-profitable hits like “Paranormal Activity,” “The Purge,” “Get Out” and “Halloween” is enduring a rare bumpy patch in theaters. Misfires in 2025 include January’s “Wolf Man” ($34 million against a $25 million budget), March’s “The Woman in the Yard” ($23 million against a $12 million budget), April’s “Drop” ($28 million against an $8 million budget), and June’s “M3GAN 2.0” ($39 million against a $25 million budget). As part of its business model, Blumhouse avoids major financial disasters by keeping costs low. But the company, which partners with Universal to distribute most of its films, is hoping that “The Black Phone 2” and this December’s “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” will help restore its luster.
“The Black Phone 2” should easily lead the domestic box office over last weekend’s champion, Disney’s sci-fi sequel “Tron: Ares,” as well as another newcomer, Aziz Ansari’s supernatural comedy “Good Fortune.”
Released by Lionsgate, “Good Fortune” is aiming for $6 million to $8 million from 2,985 theaters. The well-reviewed film cost $30 million. Ansari, best known for “Parks and Recreation” and Netflix’s “Master of None,” wrote and directed “Good Fortune,” which is his first feature film. (The multi-hyphenate was meant to make his directorial debut with Searchlight’s “Being Mortal,” which was infinitely suspended in 2022 over complaints about actor Bill Murray’s inappropriate behavior on set.) He also stars alongside Keanu Reeves, Seth Rogen and Keke Palmer.
“Good Fortune” revolves around a good-intentioned but inept angel (Reeves) who facilitates a body swap between a struggling gig worker (Ansari) and a wealthy venture capitalist (Rogen). Variety’s chief film critic Peter Debruge singled out the performance of Reeves, whom he’s dubbed “this movie’s MVP,” adding that “beneath the jokes, ‘Good Fortune’ serves as a working-class critique of contemporary capitalism.”
Overall, this weekend looks to extend a sluggish October at the box office. With the Warner Bros. video game adaptation “Mortal Kombat II” moving to 2026, movie theater attendance isn’t expected to pick up until much later in the fall season when Disney’s extraterrestrial adventure “Predator: Badlands,” Lionsgate’s heist thriller “Now You See Me: Now You Don’t,” Universal’s musical adaptation “Wicked: For Good” and Disney’s animated sequel “Zootopia 2” make their way to the big screen.
“The industry will have to wait for the holiday season to start and the big November and December titles to deliver big box office results,” says Comscore’s head of marketplace trends Paul Dergarabedian.
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