Zombie Kills With ‘Halloween’

Riding on the success of Hollywood’s first $4 billion summer, Rob Zombie’s new version of "Halloween" ended the season with a bang, scaring up a record-breaking $31 million debut.

"Halloween" cleared the previous Labor Day opening record set by "Transporter 2" in 2005, which grossed $20.1 million its first weekend.

Zombie’s flick has also surpassed the record for highest Labor Day weekend gross ever, previously held by "The Sixth Sense," which pulled $29 million in 1999.

Clark Woods, president of domestic distribution at MGM, told the Los Angeles Times "Halloween" has fared far better than most R-rated horror movies this year, many of which have flopped.

"Only a couple weeks ago, people were talking about the death of the horror movie," Woods said. "The genre sure wasn’t dead this weekend."

Because Labor Day is historically slow in terms of ticket sales, MGM and Weinstein Co. opened the movie to nearly 3,500 theatres with hopes of a big opening, he explained.

"We knew if we could get it loaded up, we could resonate with this audience," Woods said. "This looked like a weekend that was wide open."

Other Labor Day frontrunners according to Media by Numbers included "Superbad," which dropped to second place at $15.6 million and "Balls of Fury," which grossed $13.8 million.