Street Fighter Film Opens Below Resident Evil’s Box Office Debut

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Of the big fall films, I was most curious whether Resident Evil or Street Fighter would open bigger. Now we know. Street Fighter grossed about half of what Resident Evil made in its first weekend.

Deadline reports that Street Fighter, an adaptation of Capcom’s fighting game series, took in $31 million in its opening weekend. Resident Evil, based on Capcom’s horror games, opened at $60 million. It is still charting about a month after its release.

Street Fighter opened lower than Mortal Kombat 2, another fighting game adaptation from this year. It also fell short of what you would expect from a blockbuster. Still, its gross matched industry expectations before release. The weekend’s real overperformer was the Elizabeth Holmes documentary You Can See Everything. Its $15 million opening is the second-biggest ever for a theatrically released documentary.

The two movies took very different approaches. Street Fighter relied on well-known characters, fan service, and the wackiness of its source material to bring in viewers. Resident Evil kept the essence and themes of its franchise and used them to tell a completely original story.

Some fans pushed back because Resident Evil features no characters from the games. Even so, its success next to Street Fighter suggests the original-story route may work better for adaptations. Both films will stay in theaters through Halloween, where they face competition such as Clayface. We will have to see how they hold up.