Blumhouse Productions has quickly established itself as a studio to watch over the last decade and in 2017, they're having an especially noteworthy run at the box office. Specializing in crafting low-budget horror films that go on to make enormous profits, Blumhouse first made noise by releasing Paranormal Activity, which was made on a micro budget and earned nearly $200 million worldwide. Paranormal Activity would of course spawn a six-film franchise, which hauled in nearly $900 million total.
Blumhouse has had similar success with the Insidious franchise - 3 films, $372 million - and The Purge franchise - 3 films, $320 million - as well as standalone hits like M. Night Shyamalan's The Visit, which banked nearly $100 million on a $5 million budget. While every film Blumhouse releases doesn't hit that big financially, the budgets on most of them are so small that profits are nearly guaranteed. Guiding this successful journey is namesake founder Jason Blum, who takes a keen interest in all the films produced by his company.
Related: Blum: ‘Cut My Hand Off’ If Halloween Remake Not Ready by 2018
2017 has been one of Blumhouse's best years to date at the box office, with early releases Split - January 20 - and Get Out - February 24 - becoming the studio's two highest grossing films to date. Staying #1 domestically for an impressive three straight weeks, Split earned nearly $280 million worldwide on a $9 million budget, furthering Blumhouse's profitable relationship with director Shyamalan. Later, Jordan Peele's critically acclaimed Get Out would cruise to a cool $253 million on a budget of only $4.5 million.
This past weekend saw Blumhouse rack up its third big horror hit of 2017, as time-twisting slasher comedy Happy Death Day managed to surpass all advance expectations with a $26.5 million opening. This allowed the $4.8 million budgeted flick to easily knock off Blade Runner 2049 from the #1 spot. While Happy Death Day opened to considerably less than either Split or Get Out, the film's small budget means that it's likely already profitable for Blumhouse, and there's no guarantee that positive word of mouth won't lead to it holding on well in weekend two.
Next year looks poised to possibly perform even better for Blumhouse, as the studio has three big franchise entries coming up. Insidious: The Last Key arrives in January, The Purge: The Island hits theaters on July 4, and the John Carpenter-produced new Halloween movie slashes into the big screen just in time for its titular holiday. As if that wasn't enough to look forward to, it was recently announced that Chris Hardwick will team with Blumhouse to produce three new horror films, one of which the Talking Dead host will direct himself. Anyone waiting for Blumhouse's box office dominance to end will likely be waiting for a really long time.
