Nosferatu Box Office Outgrosses Smile 2 In U.S., Becoming One Of 2024’s Biggest Horror Hits

Nosferatu has hit new heights at the domestic box office. The 2024 Robert Eggers vampire movie is a remake of F. W. Murnau’s iconic German expressionist silent film of the same name, which is an unlicensed adaptation of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula that debuted in 1922. The Nosferatu release kicked off on Christmas Day 2024, becoming the highest-grossing of the four new releases that weekend, beating out the Timothée Chalamet-led Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, the Nicole Kidman erotic thriller Babygirl, and the boxing drama The Fire Inside.

Per Deadline, as of Sunday morning, the Nosferatu box office is projected to add a 3-day total of $13.2 million by the end of its second weekend in domestic theaters. This will bring its cumulative domestic total to $69.4 million, which exceeds its reported $50 million budget by nearly $20 million. That total sees it surging past the domestic grosses of Terrifier 3 ($53.8 million) and Smile 2 ($68.9 million) to become one of the highest-grossing horror movie hits of 2024.

What This Means For Nosferatu

It Could Race Past Other Horror Hits

At the time of writing, the Nosferatu remake is the fourth highest-grossing domestic horror release of the entire year. The titles above it are the indie horror hit Longlegs and two major blockbuster tentpoles, meaning that if it surpasses the former’s domestic total of $74.3 million, the Eggers movie will be the lowest-budgeted movie among the top horror titles of 2024. Below, see the horror titles currently above it on the domestic chart, not counting movies that have horror as a secondary genre such as the horror-comedies Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire or Beetlejuice Beetlejuice:

Nosferatu will likely surpass Longlegs soon and could very well continue climbing the chart of the highest-grossing 2024 horror movies at the domestic box office. Even though horror movies typically have substantial drops of 50% or more during their second weekends in theaters, the Eggers movie only dropped 39%. This is not uncommon either for Eggers horror movies (The Witch only dropped 42.4%) or holiday releases, but it has still resulted in a remarkable cumulative total after just two weekends in theaters, giving it an enormous head start as its theatrical run continues.

Our Take On The Nosferatu Box Office

Its Future Looks Bright

Another factor that could aid Nosferatu during its climb up the chart is the fact that January does not feature many major new releases. It will eventually face serious competition when the Leigh Whannell Universal monster movie Wolf Man debuts on January 17, followed by Steven Soderbergh’s haunted house movie Presence on January 24. However, it has a clear runway to keep attracting horror-hungry audiences until then, something that will likely be bolstered by its Certified Fresh 85% Rotten Tomatoes score.

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Source: Deadline