Horror has always been one of the best bets at the box office, and these five films illustrate why: Here are five classic horror movies that made 200 times their budget at the box office, or more.
What do they all have in common? Low budgets, great concepts, and no stars — because the concept is that star.
Of course, one of the films on this list did turn its lead actress into a major star.
Let’s begin.
Night of the Living Dead (1968)
George Romero’s zombie horror classic was shot in black and white near Pittsburgh for less than $125,000, with an unknown cast.
People had made zombie films before, but Romero’s had an eerie sensibility, taut storytelling, and zero camp — it felt almost like a post apocalyptic, fly-on-the-wall documentary, which is one of the reasons it’s still so watchable today.
It earned earn more than $30 million — more than 200 times its budget — and inspired a reboot, sequels, and countless imitators.
Indie filmmaking doesn’t get much more more successful than this.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre also benefitted from playing it straight — there’s a very eerie sense that everything onscreen is really happening, or could really happen.
Tobe Hooper made his film for less than $140,000, and it went on to earn $30.9 million. You can see its influence in countless films since, including X and Alien.
It’s also getting renewed attention lately thanks to the hit Netflix series Monster: The Ed Gein Story, since real-life Wisconsin killer Ed Gein helped inspire Leatherface, the main villain of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
Gein also inspired the villains of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 Psycho and 1991’s The Silence of the Lambs. And while both are very profitable classics, neither was as profitable as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which made well over 200 times its budget.
Halloween (1978)
Halloween is the sole film on this list that shot one of its leads to stardom — Jamie Lee Curtis is still going strong today, and recently won her first Oscar for her supporting role in Everything Everywhere All at Once.
Then-couple John Carpenter and Debra Hill collaborated on the tight, haunting script for Halloween, set in an all-American town named for Hill’s own birthplace, the charming Philadelphia suburb of Haddonfield, New Jersey. The result is one of the scariest horror movies of the 1970s — or any decade.
Halloween went on to earn $70 million worldwide, and to spawn a film franchise totaling a lucky 13 films in all, including Halloween Ends, which Jamie Lee Curtis has promised will be the last time she plays Laurie Strode.
We’ll see about that.
The Blair Witch Project (1999)
In the early days of widespread internet usage, people were genuinely confused about whether The Blair Witch project was a real documentary or a found-footage fictional story. The found-footage approach to filmmaking was still fresh, which made The Blair Witch Project all the more terrifying.
Constrained by their tight budget, the filmmakers made the brilliant decision to leave a lot of things out — or to imply them. The scariest scene in The Blair Witch Project, for our money, is just a guy standing in a corner, filled with guilt and shame,
Shot in Maryland for less than $1 million, it brought in $248.6 million. The Blair Witch Project spawned multiple attempts at recapturing the dark magic of the original, but almost no film ever has.
Paranormal Activity (2007)
Another triumph of found-footage horror, Oren Peli’s Paranormal Activity unfolds via stationary home video camera footage. Originally shot for $15,000, it was acquired by Paramount, which added $200,000 to the budget to heighten the scares and add a new ending.
That investment paid off: Paranormal Activity earned $194.2 million, and spawned several sequels.
You can see the influence of Paranormal Activity on a great many horror films, including the excellent recent Weapons, which features almost hypnotic Ring camera and CCTV footage of children running away… somewhere. We don’t want to spoil the movie. But if you want a very scary preview, watch this.
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Main image: A publicity still from Paranormal Activity. Paramount.