Zach Cregger's Resident Evil reboot is off to a solid start on both sides of the Pacific. In India, the survival-horror adaptation opened to a gross of Rs 3.75 crore on its first day, including Rs 50 lakh from previews, according to Pinkvilla. Trade watchers are calling it a decent start, not spectacular, but enough of a foundation to build on over the weekend.

Pinkvilla's own report flags the obvious caveat here: opening-day trade numbers are estimates, not certified figures, and the real test is whether Resident Evil shows a jump on Saturday and Sunday. A healthy weekend bump would suggest the film is actually connecting with audiences beyond the opening-day curiosity crowd. A flat one would tell a different story.

Across the Atlantic, or rather across North America, the numbers carry more weight. Koimoi reports the film pulled in $8.8 million in Thursday previews, the sixth-highest previews haul for a horror film ever at that market. That's ahead of The Conjuring: Last Rites, which did $8.5 million, and both entries in the Five Nights at Freddy's series. It still trails IT, which holds the record at $13.5 million, followed by Beetlejuice Beetlejuice at $13 million and IT Chapter Two at $10.5 million.

A director on a hot streak

This is Cregger's third R-rated outing after Barbarian and Weapons, and by most accounts his stock has never been higher. Barbarian made a modest $46.2 million worldwide off a small budget. Weapons went considerably bigger, crossing $270 million globally per Koimoi's numbers. Resident Evil arrives with the kind of pre-release buzz that comes from stacking a hot director onto a video-game IP that's been dormant on screen since the Milla Jovovich era wrapped up.

The film follows Bryan, a medical courier played by Austin Abrams, delivering cargo to a hospital on a snowy night in Raccoon City when a viral outbreak breaks loose around him. It's pitched as running parallel to the events of the Resident Evil 2 game rather than remaking it outright. Paul Walter Hauser, Zach Cherry, Kali Reis and Johnno Wilson round out the cast.

Koimoi also claims the India opening lands inside the top five Hollywood openings of 2026, ahead of Ryan Gosling's Project Hail Mary, though that comparison is worth treating as a single outlet's tracking claim rather than settled box-office record until wider numbers come in.

What happens next depends entirely on the weekend. Horror openers built on strong previews have a habit of front-loading their numbers with hardcore fans who show up on day one regardless. Whether Resident Evil holds through Saturday, in India and in North America both, will decide if this reboot has legs or just a loud entrance.