For fans of the often-maligned horror genre, seeing Backrooms and Obsession overtaking the box office has been a nice treat. Living up to its name, Obsession’s audience even grew in its 2nd and 3rd weekends, a rare feat for any film. Now the Curry Barker-directed hit has raked in $200 million globally, making it Focus Features biggest movie of all time!
It has pulled $151 million domestically, making it the studio’s biggest domestic title as well.
Heading into its 4th weekend, it did start slipping to the genre’s newer arrival, Backrooms, but by a mere 7%. And that’s after growing by 30% on its 2nd weekend, and 20% in its 3rd. The last time a movie grew at the box office like this was in 1982 with E.T.: The Extraterrestrial. Even that drip didn’t stop Obsession from setting a record for the best 4th weekend hold ever for a horror film. Smashing the 1999 record set by the Blair Witch Project.
Obsession, being shot by a 26-year-old YouTuber with a cast of lesser-known performers, on a budget of $750,000, defies every formula every studio has tried to shove at us. The fact that Focus bought the rights for $15 million makes this an insane return on investment that no studio can ignore. But really, what it’s signaling is the return to genuine storytelling that audiences have been begging for for decades. Maybe after this, we will see a resurgence in companies taking risks on smaller budget films with more unique storylines.
You can catch Obsession in theaters now.
