Horror films - main box office hits of 2024: Deadline rating
Kyiv • UNN
In 2024, low-budget horror films became the most profitable, topping the Deadline rating. Among the leaders: "A Quiet Place: Day One", "Nosferatu" and "Smile 2".
In 2024, the most profitable films were not superhero action movies or Hollywood franchises with hundreds of millions of dollars in budget, but low-budget horror films. This is reported by Deadline, writes UNN.
Details
According to Deadline's Most Valuable Blockbuster Tournament, the top releases of the year were horror films - low-budget but extremely profitable for film studios.
The prequel to the American company Paramount's franchise - "A Quiet Place: Day One" topped the ranking. The film brought the studio $83.6 million in net profit. Despite the absence of the main cast and a change of director, the film grossed $52.2 million in its first weekend, making it the best start in the entire series. The director was Michael Sarnoski, who, together with the author of the franchise, John Krasinski, managed to maintain interest in the world of survival among monsters and scale the franchise, moving the action of aliens to apocalyptic New York.
The main roles were played by Lupita Nyong'o and Joseph Quinn.
In second place is "Nosferatu" directed by Robert Eggers. His vision of the author's interpretation of the classic image of Dracula became the first such film since Francis Ford Coppola's 1992 film.
The historical gothic horror film starring Bill Skarsgård unexpectedly became a hit of the Christmas прокату and provided the film company Focus Features with $70 million in profit. In particular, as the media explains, a historical horror film is usually quite difficult to make. Proof that Focus Feature has a hit was the first trailer, which collected 65 million views worldwide, which became a record for the specialized label Universal. And the "lure" of the campaign from Focus Vice President Jason Cassidy was the trailer slogan - "He's coming!" - not to mention that Bill Skarsgård's images as a monster were not shown in the materials.
Third in terms of profitability was the sequel "Smile 2" from the film company Paramount, which managed to repeat the success of the first part and earn $55.4 million. The promotion campaign turned out to be almost as scary as the film itself.
The promotion of "Smile 2" included a campaign for Skye Riley Scott, including billboards, chalk stencil art and wild posts throughout Los Angeles that teased that her new single was coming out. On the day of the trailer launch, the art was updated to reveal the campaign for "Smile 2". The single "Grieved You" was also released along with a lyric video, followed by a music video. Similar to the marketing trick of the original 2022 film, Paramount sent "crazy smiling people" to filming at sporting events.
No less noticeable was the film "Don't Talk to Evil" - a remake of the Danish-Dutch psychological thriller, which, despite a modest start of $11.2 million, brought Universal $50 million thanks to cheap production and cooperation with Blumhouse.
Jason Bloom was a fan of the original film, but wanted to make a remake with a happier ending. Bloom approached the producers of the original film and got their consent. The film cost $15 million to produce, four days of filming took place in Croatia and the remaining 37 in England with a tax deduction of 25%. Just as Blumhouse previously touched on the dark side of James McAvoy, so did it here, in the story of a family who are invited to stay in the cottage of another family in the countryside. As the weekend goes on, they realize that their hosts are quite confused.
Closing the top five is the film "Longlegs" from indie distributor Neon, which bet on the atmosphere, intrigue and Nicolas Cage as a serial killer. The profit from the film's distribution reached $48 million.
Despite a small budget - less than $10 million, financed by C2 - the film gained huge attention thanks to an avant-garde marketing campaign, in which the image of the main antagonist was kept secret until the premiere of the film itself. The first weekend in the US brought the film $22.4 million - the best result in Neon history.
"Longlegs" became the first project in Neon's collaboration with director Osgood Perkins, and this fall the company will release two more of his films - "Monkey Man" and "The Watcher."
