Curry Barker’s breakout horror hit “Obsession” will start streaming on Peacock on July 17.
Barker’s debut film follows Bear (Michael Johnston), a hopeless romantic afraid to admit his crush for co-worker Nikki (Inde Navarrette). After making a wish for Nikki to love him more than anything else in the world, Nikki suddenly becomes dangerously obsessed with Bear. The consequences for everyone involved, as in true horror fashion, prove fatal.
The film’s digital release date was delayed due to how successful it proved to be in theaters. To date, “Obsession” has grossed $370 million worldwide on a budget of less than $1 million, making it the highest-grossing Focus Features release to date; the company acquired the film for $14 million out of last year’s Toronto International Film Festival.
“Obsession” largely found success due to strong word-of-mouth, with an “A-” grade on CinemaScore exit polls and 94% on Rotten Tomatoes. After an impressive $17.2 million domestic debut in its opening weekend, the film grew to $23.9 million in its second weekend and $27.4 million in its third weekend, an unprecedented jump.
Conversation has already swirled about the film’s award season prospects. Variety‘s Clayton Davis wrote how “Obsession” could follow the blueprint set by the success of Jordan Peele’s “Get Out,” which won the Academy Award for original screenplay: “The ingredients are here. It’s a cultural phenomenon at the box office with a star-making performance, a director with a once-in-a-generation origin story and a distributor with everything to gain by betting on it.”
Next up, Barker will release “Anything but Ghosts” starring Aaron Paul and Bryce Dallas Howard. He is also set to direct a reboot of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” for A24.
