The local cineplex was a frightening place this weekend in a lot of respects, with Paranormal Activity 2 screaming its way to a $41.5 million take and scaring off all other comers. Last week’s champ, Jacka– 3D, a sort of horror film in its own right, managed a short slide to second with $21.6 million, while another second-week holdover, RED, earned $15 mil worth of green for third place. Hereafter, the week’s other new entrant, mustered only a fourth-place finish with $12 million.
Paranormal 2′s first-place showing was the highest opening for a supernatural horror flick ever, according to boxofficemojo.com. And while it probably won’t earn Paramount Pictures the sort of jaw-dropping return on its investment the original did (Paranormal Activity, made for an estimated $11,000, banked nearly $200 million worldwide), the sequel paid off Paramount’s $3 million investment in perhaps the film’s first midnight showings. We might surmise from the end of the film that a third installment isn’t far away.
And, from the studio’s point of view, it makes sense. Why mess with success? As our reviewer Bob Hoose pointed out, Paranormal 2 is practically the same story as the first installment, only with more people, more cameras—and more body count.
And it seems as though horror films, from the days of Dracula and Frankenstein, have long been sequel crazy. How else can one explain next week’s release of the seventh Saw flick? Or the multiple incarnations of Nightmare on Elm Street, or Friday the 13th, or Halloween? Such fright flicks are cheap to make and always seem to, at least, make their money back. As long as there’s profit to be found in the till, most horror films will come with some sort of number attached to the end of the title.
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