If beating a dead horse isn’t the best start to 2018, then what the hell is? Let’s dig into the year’s first new movie!
Insidious: The Last Key (Universal)
I know I insinuated the Insidious franchise is a dead horse, but that’s not entirely fair. To its credit, the series has been successful – 2011’s first movie grossed $54 million off a $13.27m debut (4.07x multiple), 2013’s Insidious: Chapter 2 earned $83.59m off a $40.27m debut (2.08x multiple), and 2015’s Insidious: Chapter 3 fell in line with the first flick, grossing $52.22m off a $22.69m opening (2.30x multiple). Where does this leave Adam Robitel’s Insidious: The Last Key?
The early days of January have proved lucrative for horror in the past, including William Brent Bell’s godawful The Devil Inside ($33.73m debut, $53.26m total) in 2012 off an “F” rating from CinemaScore polls. Last year gave us Anna Foerster’s action-horror Underworld: Blood Wars ($13.69m debut, $30.35m total), the year before that gave us Jason Zada’s The Forest ($12.74m debut, $26.59m total). January can be reliable for decent-to-good debuts for horror titles, but typically offers little legs – case in point being 2013’s Texas Chainsaw 3D, which debuted with a stronger-than-expected $21.74m then quickly collapsed, tallying just $34.34m by run’s end.
Insidious: The Last Key’s trailer has performed better on YouTube than that for Happy Death Day (8.9 million views vs. 7.3 million), which performed well (albeit quite front-loaded) with a $26.04m opening/$55.68m total. On the other hand, The Last Key is trailing a ways behind Happy Death Day on Twitter (3.86 million views vs. 7.3 million), even more so in terms of promo views, retweets, and so on.
That’s part of the branding, though, as Happy Death Day was more invested in nabbing the young meme crowd than Insidious. The average opening for the Insidious franchise is $25.41m, with the caveat that there is large inconsistency between debuts. The Last Key can’t rely solely on goodwill for the series, either – Chapter 3 wasn’t a bust, but I don’t think it did well enough to carry the franchise forward (critically or financially). This is the fourth entry, after all. Franchise fatigue is inevitable. Not helping matters is the lack of reviews, in true horror movie fashion, leading me to believe this’ll play closer to Chapter 2’s critical reception (39% Tomatometer) than the first movie’s (65%).
That said, this is the first notable horror movie since last October’s Jigsaw ($16.64m debut/$38.05m total), so that counts for something. The Last Key also has the benefit of being the lone wide entry this weekend, meaning it can counterprogram for those not wanting to see younger-skewing movies like Star Wars: The Last Jedi or Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle. Plus, there isn’t much vying for teenager attention until Fox’s Maze Runner: The Death Cure on January 26th.
Insidious: The Last Key won’t turn a new door for the series (very sorry) and the safe range is a debut in the high-teen millions, but maybe it can play higher.
Prediction: $20 million, #3 rank
HOLDOVERS
1. Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (Sony) – $27.5 million (-45%), $229.8m cume
2. Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Disney) – $23.6 million (-55%), $569.4m cume
4. The Greatest Showman (Fox) – $10.1 million (-35%), $70.8m cume
5. Pitch Perfect 3 (Universal) – $9.3 million (-45%), $83.1m cume
6. Molly’s Game (STX) – $7 million (+197.9%), $14.1m cume
7. Ferdinand (Fox) – $6.3 million (-45%), $67.4m cume
8. Coco (Disney) – $4.5 million (-40%), $189.7m cume
9. All the Money in the World (TriStar) – $3.9 million (-30%), $20.5m cume
10. The Shape of Water (Fox Searchlight) – $3 million (-15%), $21.3m cume
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