'Obsession' and 'Backrooms' Are Destroying Our Assumptions About the Box Office

David Chen

David Chen

— 3 min read
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'Obsession' and 'Backrooms' Are Destroying Our Assumptions About the Box Office
Promotional still for 'Backrooms.' Image credit: A24.

It's an incredibly interesting time at the U.S. box office right now.

Backrooms, a movie directed by 20-year-old YouTuber Kane Parsons based on his YouTube series (which itself was based on an anonymous 4chan post), is breaking records left and right. It generated over $81 million at the box office in its opening weekend, marking the highest ever opening for an original horror film and A24's biggest opening weekend ever. Meanwhile, Obsession, an indie horror film directed by 26-year-old Curry Barker (budget: $750,000) actually made more money in its third weekend than its second – a feat that apparently hasn't been achieved since 1982's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. The film's domestic total currently stands at around $110 million. These two films follow hot on the heels of Iron Lung, a sci-fi horror film directed by Mark "Markiplier" Fishbach, which was made for $3 million and ended up grossing over $50 million globally.

I don't think it's a coincidence that Obsession and Backrooms are both horror films. Horror films have a few distinct advantages: they can be relatively cheap to make, and they lend themselves to a communal experience that can only be found in-person at the movie theater. But both films are also directed by filmmakers who found viral fame on platforms such as YouTube and TikTok, and neither film is based on legacy IP (e.g. Marvel, Star Wars, etc.). Their audiences are skewing young. The majority of ticket buyers for both films are under the age of 34, with Gen Z and younger millennials driving a ton of business. It turns out the kids will show up if you give them an experience that they can't get anywhere else. Pre-existing fandom also plays a role, with analytics firm Brighter Path estimating that Kane Parsons' existing YouTube fans accounted for 22% of opening weekend demand.

It feels like we are at an inflection point in Hollywood history, like we'll look back on this time as one of the moments when things changed. I wasn't around back then but I imagine that this was how people felt when Jaws and Star Wars came out in the 1970s. Both movies were directed by folks in their 20s, they both destroyed box office records, and they both basically helped invent the summer box office season that Obsession and Backrooms currently find themselves in. It must have been strange to be a film fan back then, watching Hollywood slip into a world of high-concept summer blockbusters with ubiquitous advertising that targeted huge opening weekends – all concepts that were relatively new at the time.

There's been a lot of doomsaying recently (including by yours truly) about how the old ways of Hollywood are dying. Maybe they are, but maybe we are now witnessing the birth of what comes next. What will the new era be? Hopefully it won't (just) consist of an Obsession and Backrooms extended universe, although those are most certainly on the way. Hopefully it will see Hollywood giving more chances to young talent tackling unproven concepts with original ideas. And probably it will require them to have some built-in following and fandom online already. It looks like all that time you spent honing your YouTube skills won't be wasted after all.

A research firm called Screen Engine analyzed the habits of 200 kids ages 17-18 and, according to Variety, "found that they’re tired of superheroes, sequels and spinoffs, care considerably less about big-name stars and directors, and mostly learn about upcoming projects via short-form videos on social media." Given this, it's stark watching the success of Backrooms and Obsession while Disney's Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu seems to be collapsing at the box office. The latter had a combined production and marketing budget of over $300 million but had the worst first and second weekends of any Star Wars film in the Disney era and has taken in about $140 million at the domestic box office so far. It's possible that Obsession or Backrooms may end up outgrossing it. It was reported that IMAX is even pulling some of Mandalorian's screens at the last minute to give them to another upcoming summer blockbuster. That movie? Masters of the Universe, a movie based on the toy line that came out in 1982 and which currently looks like it's heading towards a disappointing $33 million opening.

Maybe the transition to the new era will take just a little longer.

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