Three movies debuted in the top three positions at box offices in North America this weekend, with "The Conjuring 2" clinching the top spot.
"The Conjuring 2" debuted at 3,343 locations with 40.4 million U.S. dollars in ticket sales across the United States and Canada, becoming the first horror film taking the first place since the family-friendly horror "Goosebumps" last October.
The horror sequel opened 3.5 percent behind the 41.8 million dollars opening weekend of its predecessor "The Conjuring" in July 2013, according to the box office tracker comScore.
"The Conjuring 2" earned an "A-" from first-night moviegoers on CinemaScore, and it received a good 75 percent of positive rating from the critics on RottenTomatoes.
The audience who watched the film split a fairly even gender ratio with 52 percent female audience, and 57 percent of the audience over age 25.
Internationally, "The Conjuring 2" grossed 50 million dollars which raised its total box office income to 90.3 million dollars around the world.
A movie adaptation of the video game "Warcraft" debuted in second place with 24.4 million dollars projected sales at 3,400 locations, disappointing for such a high-budget with 160 million dollars.
Critics said this Universal's fantasy video game adaptation could have probablyed gain more from box office if it was released several years ago, considering that subscriptions to the game upon which it was based peaked in 2010 and are currently at less than half their peak, according to numbers from Forbes.
The film earned a "B+" on CinemaScore and 46 percent of its audience was over 30.
Compared to other recent video game adaptations, "Warcraft" started 36.1 percent behind the 38.15 million dollars opening of "The Angry Birds Movie" in May.
Lionsgate's "Now You See Me 2" opened in third with an estimated 23 million dollars. Though the thriller sequel starred with an all-star cast including Morgan Freeman, Mark Ruffalo, Daniel Radcliffe, Jesse Eisenberg, and Michael Caine, it opened 21.5 percent below the 29.4 million dollars opening of the original "Now You See Me" in May 2013.
Last week's top winner, Paramount's "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows" dropped 58.1 percent to the fourth place in its second weekend with an estimated 14.8 million dollars. It has grossed more than 61 million dollars in ticket sales after 10 days of exhibition.
The remaining 10 most-popular films in the U.S. and Canada were "X-Men: Apocalypse" (10 million dollars), "Me Before You" (9.2 million), "The Angry Birds Movie" (6.7 million), "Alice Through The Looking Glass" (5.6 million), "Captain America: Civil War" (4.3 million) and "The Jungle Book" (2.7 million).
