Vin Diesel has carved a unique niche in Hollywood as the guy who stars in larger-than-life, complete suspension of belief films that are high on fun and low on depth. The dialogue in most of his films reads like well thought out tweets, and yet somehow he’s managed to remain one of the biggest box office draws for the past decade. This weekend he put his personal finances on the line when Riddick arrived in theaters, and this morning we learned his gamble has officially paid off.

After The Chronicles Of Riddick failed to live up to the success of Pitch Black, most thought the character of Riddick was shelved until someone decided to create a remake. Vin Diesel disagreed. In fact, he spent almost every year since the release of Chronicles trying to get a new film made, and ultimately decided to do it himself. Putting his house on the line, Diesel self-funded Riddick with the hopes of potentially launching a new trilogy of sci-fi films. The final budget is rumored to be around $20 million, and if that is the case then the film nearly recouped all costs in the last 72 hours.

Opening Friday with a modest $9 million, Riddick went on to top the weekend box office with a total of $18.7 million in ticket sales. That’s an extremely weak number one haul, especially when compared to the box office hits of June and July, but it’s a number one spot nonetheless. Whether or not it means Vin Diesel will get the sequel he spoke of remains to be seen, but it’s certainly a possibility.

Outside of Riddick‘s success there were few notable moves to be found on the charts. The Butler is pushing closer to $100 million in receipts, and We’re The Millers just became Jason Sudeikis’ biggest hit with a current total of $108 million. You can view the complete box office rundown below.

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James Shotwell

James Shotwell is the founder of Under The Gun Review. He loves writing about music and movies almost as much as he loves his two fat cats. He's also the co-founder of Antique Records and the Marketing Coordinator for Haulix. You should probably follow him on Twitter.

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