Halloween Box Office is Hot for Horror!

Date: Tuesday, November 02, 1999

Warner Brothers' scary remake, HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL, exceeded weekend box office estimates, climbing to $15.9-million for the Halloween weekend. Meanwhile, both USA Films' BEING JOHN MALKOVICH and Miramax's PRINCESS MONONOKE made strong bows in exclusive debuts, which bode well for their wide releases this Friday.

HAUNTED HILL had been pegged to reach $15.1-million, based on its Friday and Saturday showings. Its better-than-expected showing on Sunday was quite a trick, considering that Halloween (not traditionally a big film-going evening) fell on that day.

The surreal comedy BEING JOHN MALKOVICH earned $637,000 in only 25 engagements, for a whopping $25,500 per screen average. Hayao Miyazaki's PRINCESS MONONOKE also had an impressive per screen average ($17,500), earning a total of $140,000 in eight theatres.

The debut of horror maestro Wes Craven's non-genre offering, MUSIC OF THE HEART, was less auspicious; the film earned $3.7, landing in fifth place.

THE SIXTH SENSE got a slight bump from horror fans out for a good scare. The film climbed up to 8th place after having descended to 10th on the previous weekend.

The weekend's top genre box office winners are listed below, followed by their three-day grosses and a number indicating their overall ranking.

HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL - $15.9-million (1)
AMERICAN BEAUTY - $3.8-MILLION (4)
BRINGING OUT THE DEAD - $3.4-million (6)
FIGHT CLUB $3.3-million (7)
THE SIXTH SENSE 3.2-million (8)

BATS $2.2-million (11)
THE OMEGA CODE $1.4-million (15)