Focus Features’ Obsession added $19 million over the weekend to its mighty domestic haul nearing $200 million. That makes four consecutive weekends of Curry Barker’s low-budget horror hit outgrossing its own debut weekend.
With A24’s internet-inspired Backrooms sitting comfortably at a domestic $160 million and nearly $250 million worldwide, plus a Scary Movie reboot likely to cross the $100 million mark in the U.S. this weekend, it’s clear Obsession is in good company.
But does this amount to peak performance for the resurgent genre?
Obsession, Backrooms and Scream 7 form a trifecta of scary flicks keeping this year on pace to match 2025 in terms of horror films hitting the $100 million domestic mark. Like last year’s Sinners and Weapons on the Warner Bros. slate, Obsession and Backrooms are also original material, albeit from smaller distributors and made for much cheaper.
Until this point, indie horror franchise Terrifier was largely seen as the most recent made-for-pennies horror success story, though its last entry only made it up to $53 million domestically.
Likewise, YouTuber Markiplier’s self-financed debut effort, Iron Lung, amassed an impressive $50 million overall at the start of the year, showing how dramatic of an escalation the YouTube-to-Hollywood trend underwent over the past few weeks, thanks to Barker and Backrooms director Kane Parsons’ theatrical successes.
Nearly three decades ago, The Blair Witch Project’s seminal found-footage take delivered huge profits off a nothing budget, joining The Sixth Sense and The Mummy in reaffirming horror’s viability back when Scream films were doing the heavy lifting.
However, horror audiences wavered for years after. While Blumhouse would later establish itself through its found-footage juggernaut Paranormal Activity, the entire genre was eclipsed by the success of Twilight’s five-film run, which recalibrated major studios’ strategies around PG-13 preferences to maximize potential audience at a time when superhero franchises were soaring. However, Jordan Peele’s Get Out and two It films swung R-rated horror back into the mix before the pandemic lockdowns.
Since then, the sheer number of recent success stories for original horror makes this era feel elevated, but there are asterisks. For one, Backrooms and Obsession came after far less turnout for Neon’s Hokum, which reviewed well and was heavily marketed, only to struggle against The Devil Wears Prada 2 when they kicked off the first weekend of May together.
May 15 and May 29, respectively, for Obsession and Backrooms proved to be smarter windows, as an influx of students finishing their school terms combined with mixed reception for Disney’s The Mandalorian and Grogu to erase the notion of competition altogether.
Backrooms’ original IP status is also dubious. Based on community-driven internet storytelling started by a meme, Parsons’ Backrooms YouTube has made the 20-year-old an ambassador for an otherwise ownerless property, beyond what’s actually copyrighted for A24’s rendition.
There are a lot more bets to come this year. Neon and Mubi continue to throw their weight behind original horror efforts, a durable strategy after Longlegs and The Substance, their respective top films at the box office, became breakout hits in 2024.
Neon’s LGBTQ+ horror Leviticus goes first this weekend as an aptly timed Pride Month option that isn’t competing with Toy Story 5’s family audience. On the contrary, Her Private Hell from Nicolas Winding Refn will release in the shadow of Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, a huge summer contender following Oppenheimer’s theatrical and awards run three years ago, plus advance ticket sales that overwhelmed AMC’s servers.
It’s no surprise most distributors are holding their horror hopefuls for August to give them room away from Nolan, though Warners will utilize a narrow window for its next Evil Dead outing a week before The Odyssey.
Other franchises to come are a sixth Insidious film, part of Wan and Jason Blum’s merged portfolio, as well as a sequel to Lionsgate’s scrappy Fall. After those, Sony is rebooting its Resident Evil gaming IP for film once again, this time via Weapons director Zach Cregger, while Clayface will add a horror option to James Gunn’s rebooted DC Universe.
In the meantime, Hollywood is jumping on viral projects from other YouTubers, proving this trend isn’t going away anytime soon.
