EXCLUSIVE: By the end of this week or sooner, Sony/Constantin’s Resident Evil will become Zach Cregger‘s highest-grossing movie at the global box office. It will surpass his previous high, New Line’s Weapons, which ended its run at $270M worldwide.
This all comes with the theatrical release of Resident Evil in China on Monday. Through Monday and Tuesday the pic has collected $20M, on course for what is expected to be a $35M first week. The global running cume for Cregger’s Resident Evil stood at $245.4M through its third weekend as of Sunday, and with China the Austin Abrams-starring zombie title will easily propel past $280M WW.
The big gross in the Middle Kingdom comes as no surprise as the Capcom game permeated the culture pre-Covid, with the Milla Jovovich-starring Resident Evil: The Final Chapter a monster hit there in 2017 with a reported $94.3M opening (not accounting for inflation and currency swings) and a $159.5M final total, repping 51% of that pic’s final global tally of $312.2M. Final Chapter remains the highest-grossing Resident Evil in the franchise, followed by 2010’s 3D-driven Resident Evil: Afterlife with $300.2M WW and then Cregger’s take.
With a strong Douban score of 7.2, Resident Evil beats the openings of such horror movies this year in China as Obsession ($4.8M), Backrooms ($5.2M) and even the reported opening of Alien: Romulus ($26.1M) in 2024.
This weekend, offshore openings include Sony’s The Social Reckoning with a 92% footprint and a limited rollout of Universal/Blumhouse Atomic Monster’s The Other Mommy starring Jessica Chastain with bows in Mexico, Australia and UK and other big territories going later.
Cregger’s next movie in the hopper is the original sci-fi movie Flood at the Skydance-owned Warner Bros. Before the merger closed, it was announced that Oscar winner Jennifer Lawrence would star in that movie which is currently dated for an August 11, 2028 release. Weapons prequel Gladys is currently in rewrites before going out to directors, with that pic dated for a September 8, 2028 release through New Line.