Box Office for Horror Movies is Weak

That's what happens when you flood the market--demand goes down.

I'm hoping that more studios will take note of the success of films like Waitress, and start funding more smaller-budget, well-written romantic comedies and light dramas for summer release.

Interesting article, Jesse. Anybody have thoughts on the reasons?

It isn't unusual for genres to go through cycles (look at the romantic comedy glut of a few years ago). Is it that? Perhaps fueled by the classic instance where everybody copies an unexpected success without bothering to add the quality that caused the success in the first place?

Or have horror movies set the gore level higher than the audience will stomach?

Or is life so stressful these days that horror movies remind people of the stresses rather than cause a catharsis? Or (thinking of the "radiation creates big creatures that go on rampages" movies of the '50s) are horror movies creating catharsis for the wrong stresses?

I'm not much of a horror movie fan, especially where gore is involved. But it's an interesting question.

I say it's glut/cyclical. Horror movies of one type or another cycle through every decade, it seems. We've already had the "torture" cycle and the "J-horror" cycle, pretty much simultaneously (though I think the latter pre-dated, burned and in some ways initiated the former in that the extreme cycle has been in reaction to the PG-13 cycle) in the 'oughts.

Of course, we're rank amateurs compared to the Italians and Hong Kong for taking a trend and glutting the hell out of it.

I'm hoping that more studios will take note of the success of films like Waitress, and start funding more smaller-budget, well-written romantic comedies and light dramas for summer release.

You'd think the movie making its first $10 million from only a handful of theaters might make them want to. Plus, it looks like it cost maybe a half million to make. But I definitely think this sort of quality is lightning in a bottle—we could just get a rash of soulless Wedding Planner type movies if the studios decide it's a trend they want to milk.

That's a strange article. There certainly are cycles to genres, but I don't know if I buy the examples he's using.

28 Days Later made $10 million in its opening weekend. 28 Weeks Later made... $9.8 million. I'm sure they hoped it would do better, but that's not exactly a shocking decline, especially when there were 4 years between the two movies.

Hostel came out in the dead zone of January. A year later, they gambled and released the sequel against summer blockbusters. They lost.

Whereas Saw and its sequels all came out in late October. So did The Ring, and The Grudge, and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake, and some other horror movies that made a lot of money because, hello, it's October. If the next Saw does badly, I'd be more convinced that there's been a real change in what audiences want to see. Disturbia's PG13, and I think more suspense/horror, but it's still going strong after 2 months.

I know that freaky J-horror inspired Messengers movie has an entire wall of rented-out empty boxes at my local chain video store. That doesn't say the genre is falling out of favor to me.

"J-horror"?

Japanese horror?

Yes, specifically the ghost-themed scarefests relying on suspense rather than scaly monsters that have been coming out of Japan since Ringu.

Looks like ABC will be showing the first three Harry Potter films from 7/6-7/8, and during the breaks will be showing little tidbits from OotP. They'll most likely be online at the main HP websites (Mugglenet, Leaky Cauldron, etc.) soon afterwards.