from Entertainment Weekly

How low-budget horror movie The Wretched became America’s No. 1 film

The supernatural shocker expanded to 45 drive-ins this weekend.

By Clark Collis

The Wretched
IFC MIDNIGHT

At the start of the year, the biggest movies set to be released in May looked like Fast & Furious 9Spiral: From the Book of SawBlack WidowScoob, and Artemis Fowl. Instead, the coronavirus outbreak prompted studios to either postpone the movies’ premieres or announce that they would debut on a streaming service. The most successful new film, according to Box Office Mojo, has been a supernatural indie-horror movie called The Wretched, which has dominated the website’s daily chart since it was released on May 1. As of Thursday, The Wretched  — about a teenager who discovers that a malevolent witch is living next door to his father — had been the No. 1 film in America for three weeks.

“It’s actually been a complete shock and kind of insane,” says the Detroit-raised Brett Pierce, who directed the film with his brother Drew. “We were a little movie from Michigan. We always aimed for the moon, but with an independent film you think, Yeah, we’ll come out in a few theaters, and we’ll play for like a week, and maybe ten people will see it. Most people are going to see it when we land on a streaming service at some point. Each week it just kept on getting bigger, it was one of those things where you just don’t believe it as it’s happening. We’re going to be a Jeopardy question one day, because we’re going to be the lowest-grossing most successful film.”

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