RIALTO DISTRIBUTION has put horror front and centre in Australian cinemas with 2021’s WRONG TURN, the seventh film in the WRONG TURN franchise. The film has become a box office hit, earning over $600,000 since opening on February 4th (including sneak previews), firmly placing it as the 2nd highest earner per screen of any film in wide release at the moment.
The film is doing a lot of the heavy lifting at two of the biggest cinema chains in the country. At Hoyts, it’s accounting for 43% of all of the chain’s box office and at Event Cinemas it’s grabbed 25% of their total box office income. Part of the film’s success is the $40,000 haul at just three of the countries Drive-Ins.
Rialto Distribution’s Kevin Gordon said of the performance “it’s fantastic to see audiences flocking to cinemas to see WRONG TURN, for what is truly an incredible cinema experience. We are hoping to see box office break the $1M box office mark in week two, and if audiences continue to respond as they already have, the film may go on to earn significantly more in the coming weeks.”
WRONG TURN is an intense, action-packed horror-thriller, marking a fresh take on the classic “backwoods” horror staple. Twenty-something Jen (Charlotte Vega) and five of her close friends are hiking in the Appalachians in West Virginia, Jen’s boyfriend Darius (Adain Bradley) suggests they head off-trail to visit a Civil War fort. The group stumble upon a community of settlers called the “Foundation” who have been living off the mountain since the mid 1800s when they cut themselves off from the rest of the United States. Led by the imposing John Venable (Bill Sage), the Foundation will do anything to protect their existence from outside influence. Suddenly under siege, Jen and her friends seem headed to the point of no return- unless Jen’s father (Golden Globe nominee Matthew Modine) can reach them in time.
The film sees the team behind the WRONG TURN franchise, producer Robert Kulzer and writer Alan B. McElroy return to the series with director Mike P. Nelson helming his second feature, following THE DOMESTICS in 2018.
