{"id":638656,"date":"2026-06-14T18:32:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-14T18:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/638656\/"},"modified":"2026-06-14T18:32:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-14T18:32:09","slug":"box-office-obsession-beats-blair-witch-project-film-fest-record","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/638656\/","title":{"rendered":"Box Office: ‘Obsession’ Beats ‘Blair Witch Project’, Film Fest Record"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tFrom UK to India to Mexico and Saudi Arabia, moviegoers are transfixed by Nikki and Bear\u2019s toxic relationship as Focus Features\/Blumhouse\u2019s Obsession<\/a> now counts a running global cume of $286.5M. <\/p>\n

\n\tThat arguably makes it the highest grossing movie to ever be picked up at a film festival (that is after being auctioned post premiere; not a market package ala when Paramount acquired Denis Villeneuve\u2019s Arrival out of Cannes), beating Blair Witch Project<\/a>\u2018s reported final global of $248.6M. That found footage horror pic was acquired out of Sundance 1999 for $1M+ by Artisan. <\/p>\n

\n\tAs we first told you, Focus Features picked up the Capstone $750K financed Obsession for $15M+ out of TIFF Midnight (North American and some foreign territories). For quite some time post Covid, film festival pick-ups have been sluggish (though foreign films do sell at Cannes) with the yields at the box office often lower than the frenzied, ratcheted up auction prices. Let the record show that Obsession provides hope to such fest marketplaces, not to mention it underscores how genre movies are the best bang for their buck. <\/p>\n

\n\tStateside at $19M, the Curry Barker directed, Indie Navarrette, Michael Johnston, Cooper Tomlinson starring horror romance saw its fourth consecutive weekend (out of five) best its opening frame ($17.1M). The pic\u2019s running cume of $188.3M is pacing 7% ahead of 1999\u2019s summer breakout spooky movie, The Sixth Sense; that Oscar nominated movie finaling at $293.5M domestic. <\/p>\n

\n\tIn addition, Obsession bested the global cume of Blumhouse and Universal\u2019s Oscar winning Get Out<\/a> which finale at $259.9M. Why comp to that? Because that\u2019s another horror movie made at a thrifty price, that being $4.5M, and which launched a directing career out of a canon, that being Jordan Peele\u2019s. While Obsession has bested Star Wars: Mandalorian and Grogu\u2018s domestic take of $165M, Nikki and Bear have yet to shoot down the bounty hunter and baby Yoda\u2019s space ship around the globe, that $165M net production now at a global running cume of $315.1M. <\/p>\n

\n\tBroken down, Obsession made $34.1M in its fifth global weekend (international 59 territories was $15.1M; of that Universal\u2019s markets minted $11.8M, non-Uni markets were $3.3M). Overall foreign cume is $98.1M (Uni territories $77.4M, non-Uni is $20.6M). <\/p>\n

\n\tThe\u00a0UK & Ireland\u00a0enjoyed another outstanding hold this weekend at No.3 in the market with $2M; Disclosure Day taking the top spot there. The Barker movie is now the highest-grossing 18-rated Horror of all-time. The weekend dropped an exceptional -20%, despite good weather after a week of rain, with all other holdover films collectively dropping -64%. The cume has now surpassed the lifetimes of\u00a0Get Out,\u00a0Smile,\u00a0Weapons,\u00a0and\u00a0Nosferatu,\u00a0becoming the\u00a0seventh-biggest Horror of all-time. The weekend totaled $2.0M to reach $17.7M cume.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tObsession remains the No. 1 Hollywood pic in India currently with $1.8M this weekend for an $8M cume, ahead of the lifetimes of Horror tentpoles\u00a0The Nun,\u00a0The Nun 2, Annabelle Creation, and\u00a0Final Destination Bloodlines\u00a0to become the\u00a0third biggest horror film of all-time\u00a0in the market.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe\u00a0movie ranked as No. 1 in U.A.E. and No.2 in Saudi Arabia behind local hit\u00a07 Dogs. The weekend totaled $1.6M overall in the Middle East region to reach $12.4M cume as the\u00a0second-biggest horror film there.<\/p>\n

\n\tMexico\u2019s $1M comes with both the World Cup and Disclosure Day invading the country, a -20% hold for a No. 5 rank his weekend. The $6.8M cume has now surpassed the lifetimes of\u00a0Invisible Man\u00a0and\u00a0Scream VI.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe\u00a0Philippines\u00a0saw a +97% uplift in Wknd 3, adding $500K to reach $1.3M cume, surpassing the lifetimes of\u00a0M3GAN\u00a0and\u00a0Weapons.<\/p>\n

\n\tIsrael\u00a0also held in weekend 3, -4% with $500K and a $1.8M running total, besting the lifetimes of\u00a0Annabelle Creation,\u00a0The Nun,\u00a0Happy Death Day, and\u00a0Smile 2.<\/p>\n

\n\tNikki and Bear were No. 2 in the\u00a0Netherlands\u00a0with $400K and a $3.2M total, that cume ahead of such lifetimes as Weapons\u00a0and\u00a0Smile 2\u00a0since last weekend and is on track to overtake\u00a0Sinners\u00a0today.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt\u2019s fair to say for many around the globe, cat sandwich never tasted so good. <\/p>\n

Top Weekend HoldoversTerritoryWk #LocationsWkndDropCume (in millions)UK & Ireland5527$2.048-20%$17.697India3647$1.772-18%$7.958Mexico5459$1.037-20%$6.847U.A.E.459$755K-26%$4.619Saudi Arabia459$641K-32%$4.530Philippines3113$522K+97%$1.275Israel333$509K-4%$1.824Netherlands599$434K-19%$3.191Italy5226$391K-27%$4.676Poland5127$329K-25%$2.823Turkey5117$318K+54%$1.325Norway448$267K+51%$1.403Argentina550$254K-2%$1.217Others Middle East413$227K-64%$3.210Belgium539$225K-17%$1.272<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From UK to India to Mexico and Saudi Arabia, moviegoers are transfixed by Nikki and Bear\u2019s toxic relationship…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":638657,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[215586,96,30563,2839,14159,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-638656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-blair-witch-project","tag-entertainment","tag-get-out","tag-movies","tag-obsession","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=638656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638656\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/638657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=638656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=638656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=638656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}