Exorcist: Believer Box Office Previews Pull in $2.85 Million

Exorcist: Believer, the latest installment in the decades-old horror franchise, earned $2.85 million in Thursday night previews last night, putting the movie roughly on pace to make between $30 million and $36 million in its opening frame, easily making it the week's #1 movie. Last week's top-seller, PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie, is expected to take second place, followed by Saw X, The Creator, and The Nun II. Early projections for Exorcist: Believer had it closer to the $30 million end (Box Office Pro thinks closer to $27 million), but the strong preview night likely means this will be the franchise's biggest-ever opening weekend.

Directed by David Gordon Green, Exorcist: Believer brings Ellen Burstyn back to the franchise for the first time since the original Exorcist, released in1973. Burstyn reprises her role as Chris MacNeil, an actress who has been forever altered by what happened to her daughter Regan five decades before. While The Exorcist is a franchise that has been constantly active in the years since the original, often with little to show for it at the box office, the original remains a classic, and marked the first time a horror movie was nominated for Best Picture.

The hope, obviously, is that Green and Burstyn can bring a similar urgency and energy to The Exorcist: Believer that Green and Jamie Lee Curtis brought to the recent Halloween legacy sequel trilogy. Whether that's plausible, considering that Halloween had more commercial successes than The Exorcist has in the years since the original, is anybody's guess.

When The Exorcist, based on the best-selling book by William Peter Blatty, was released, it became a cultural phenomenon, changing horror forever, breaking box office records, and scooping up a shocking 10 Academy Award nominations, becoming the first horror film ever nominated for Best Picture. 

Here's how Blumhouse describes The Exorcist: Believer:

Exactly 50 years ago this fall, the most terrifying horror film in history landed on screens, shocking audiences around the world. Now, on Friday, October 13, a new chapter begins. From Blumhouse and director David Gordon Green, who shattered the status quo with their resurrection of the Halloween franchise, comes The Exorcist: Believer.  

Since the death of his pregnant wife in a Haitian earthquake 12 years ago, Victor Fielding (Tony winner and Oscar® nominee Leslie Odom, Jr.; One Night in Miami, Hamilton) has raised their daughter, Angela (Lidya Jewett, Good Girls) on his own.

But when Angela and her friend Katherine (newcomer Olivia Marcum), disappear in the woods, only to return three days later with no memory of what happened to them, it unleashes a chain of events that will force Victor to confront the nadir of evil and, in his terror and desperation, seek out the only person alive who has witnessed anything like it before: Chris MacNeil.

The film also stars Emmy winner Ann Dowd (The Handmaid's Tale, Hereditary) as Victor and Angela's neighbor, and Grammy winner Jennifer Nettles (Harriet, The Righteous Gemstones) and two-time Tony winner Norbert Leo Butz (Fosse/Verdon, Bloodline) as the parents of Katherine, Angela's friend.

The Exorcist: Believer is directed by David Gordon Green from a screenplay by Peter Sattler (Camp X-Ray) and David Gordon Green, from a story by Scott Teems (Halloween Kills), Danny McBride (Halloween trilogy) and David Gordon Green, based on characters created by William Peter Blatty.

The film is produced by Jason Blum for Blumhouse and by David Robinson and James G. Robinson for Morgan Creek Entertainment. The executive producers are Danny McBride, David Gordon Green, Stephanie Allain, Ryan Turek and Atilla Yücer. Universal Pictures presents a Blumhouse/Morgan Creek Entertainment production in association with Rough House Pictures.