CAA: Nobody saw $1M Obsession becoming $520M hit

“We had no idea that Obsession was going to become Obsession.” That was CAA Media Finance co-head Roeg Sutherland speaking at the Zurich Summit, describing the rise of a horror film made for $1 million that went on to gross $520 million worldwide, as reported by Deadline.

The numbers tell the story. Directed by Curry Barker, Obsession sold out of Toronto to Focus Features for around $14 million in a domestic deal, meaning the United States and Canada, co-represented by CAA and Capstone, according to the same report. The sale price was 14 times the production budget. The return since has been far larger.

Sutherland’s figures put the film at $264 million in the U.S. and $520 million globally. That is up sharply from $60.7 million in North America and $75 million worldwide reported by Variety in May, showing how long the film kept running after its early weeks.

He was not the only film-maker in Zurich caught off guard by the scale of success. Kane Parsons, the director of Backrooms, said there was no real sense of what the film would do before release, even at the height of projections, Deadline reported.

Backrooms was made for $10 million and distributed by A24. It has grossed $400 million globally. For a film at that budget level, that is a 40-to-one return on production cost before marketing and other expenses are counted.

Parsons also pushed back on labels. He said he does not see Backrooms as aligned with the horror genre, in comments reported separately by Deadline. During a panel in Zurich, the film’s performance was cited as a prime example of a younger generation’s desire to go to the movies, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The wider market gave context. CAA Media Finance co-head Sarah Schweitzman described the summer domestic box office at $4.7 billion, calling it record-breaking. The Zurich Summit, whose programme covers artificial intelligence, streaming, finance and distribution, has made those low-budget breakouts a central talking point.

What makes this stand out is the chain. A $1 million shoot becomes a $14 million Toronto sale. Then it becomes a $520 million global grosser. Nobody planned that path, even the people who sold it.