Why horror kills at the box office

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0:59Anytime anyone goes into a darkened basement, people freak. And yeah, I just think it's been by far the most innovative film genre of the past 15 years. The suspense is building, building, building.

1:17Jonquilyn Hill:I'm John Glenn Hill. This is Explain It To Me From Vox. Okay, you guys, I'm not big on truly scary stuff. I'm a little bit of a scaredy cat. Once my friend convinced me to go see It with her in theaters, I do not know why I did that. I'm Pennywise the Dancing Clown. And when I got home, I turned on all the lights in my apartment and watched old episodes of SpongeBob as a palate cleanser before I could go to sleep. I wish I lived there. Really? No. But recently, I've been dabbling. And a lot of you more than dabble. At a very young age, all of my brothers and sisters, we were watching all of the horror movies that you should not watch.

2:02I'm a lover of all things monstrous, always has been. I love the aesthetic of the scary, the teeth, the claws. Just think it's cool. We always have the really gory, gruesome Halloween costumes. I have always been like a scary cat, but about five years ago I started watching horror movies during Halloween with my roommate. And I think it's because horror movies today are like kind of the last vestige of that kind of mid-budget movie. It's not like a huge Marvel blockbuster that feels all the same. And I feel really great when I get a sense of exhilaration from the danger presented in a horror movie, but I'm actually safe in the audience.

2:44Jonquilyn Hill:It seems we're in a kind of scary movie renaissance. At a time when the box office is kind of in a slump, fear's keeping it alive. That's according to Paul Daguerrebedian. He's head of Marketplace Trends for Comscore, which keeps track of box office trends. And he is biased towards horror films.

3:06So I have a longstanding relationship to horror movies, having grown up with three older sisters. They love movies, and yet I was too young to go see The Exorcist, and they snuck me in to see it. No, please, mother, make it stop! It's burning! It's burning! I'm traumatized to this day in a good way because I absolutely was blown away by the movie. What that movie proved to me is that seeing a horror movie in a movie theater, the only way I could hide from the scariness on screen as a kid was to cover my eyes, you know, and I was embarrassed to do so. But you're in that darkened room, so it really is in that communal environment.

3:44You can feel the electricity, the energy of people. That was really cool when you're in a theater and everybody kind of collectively jumps. Horror movies create that sense of dread, that fear factor.

3:55Jonquilyn Hill:You talk about this sense of, you know, dread. Is that the definition of a horror movie? How have the definition of horror movies changed in recent years? Has it? I don't think it has. I think that's what's so pure and cool about horror movies. is that they really haven't changed. If you go back to Nosferatu, starring Max Schreck way back, I believe it was the early 20s. You know, the horror movie genre has been a staple of cinema since the beginning, since the dawn of cinema. And I think it is just always been the same in that collectively as human beings, we, you know, it's in our, baked into our DNA to be afraid of certain tropes, situations, you know, the cues, the music cues that make you go, oh, wow.

4:38something scary is about to happen. That all plays in there, but I think the basic idea of what horror is, is that sense of dread.

4:52When you go see The Conjuring and that music swells at the beginning with the, mmm, that ominous music and the Warner Brothers logo, New Line logos come up and you're just braced and ready to go. People are giggling, it's kind of that nervous laughter. and so it's about the communal experience, but also what's going on in your head. Horror really can separate different personality types. Yeah. If you're like, I love horror movies, I want the most R-rated, scary, gross. You know, some people are into like, you know, bodies being dismembered.

5:28Torture porn, as they used to unfortunately call it, those kind of movies, but to each his own, whatever you should, look at Terrifier. Now for a guy who doesn't speak, he sure makes a lot of noise. Please welcome Art the Clown. I almost can't even watch that. Like, first of all, don't eat while you're watching Art the Clown. Good to know. And then there's the more cerebral films, you know, Get Out, Us, Jordan Peele's films, Conjuring, I would say, especially the first Conjuring back in 2013, just a great movie. And as relevant today as we saw recently with that massive 84 million domestic opening for The Conjuring Last Rites, which blew the doors off and surprised a lot of people.

6:12And horror movies have already surpassed a billion dollars in domestic box office. According to our Comscore data, horror movies continue to thrill audiences.

6:22Jonquilyn Hill:Have scary movies always been such a big moneymaker? They generally have. They're actually very profitable. So even like back in the day, you would have a movie like the original Halloween to the very modest budget and then just became this box office juggernaut. But generally, I always say until now or until in the last maybe decade or so, I would always call horror the Rodney Dangerfield of genres. It can't get no respect. Well, that's the story of my life. No respect. Because a lot of times it would happen as a money grab, there's no better genre than horror, at least traditionally. With horror, it's so much in your head.

7:03And the situations don't necessarily require CGI, although of course that happens. But if you look at a movie like Weapons. At 2.17 in the morning, every kid woke up, got out of bed, walked downstairs, and into the dark. From Zach Krager, who also directed Barbarian. Barbarian is a very lo-fi movie. I mean, there's these small, intimate situations that are scary because they are just that. They're more confined. And that really works. But as a general rule, to make a very effective horror movie, you don't have to spend a fortune so they can be bloody profitable at the end of the day. Can you tell us who's leading the way in horror right now in 2025?

7:49If you just look at Sinners, Sinners for me is one of the best movies of the past five years, maybe more. It goes beyond the horror genre. And to have Ryan Coogler directing Michael B. Jordan, that great cast, the entire premise, the music. There are legends of people born with the gift of making music so true, it can pierce the veil between life and death, conjuring spirits from the past. Somebody take me And the future It almost doesn't do it justice just to say that that Sinners is a horror movie because it's so much more. And then to be followed up by Final Destination Bloodlines, another older horror franchise.

8:40Can you please? For the 1500th time, no one gives a shit about your stupid little death curse, okay? So take a hint and leave us alone because death's not coming for our family. Again, over-performing at the box office. And then at the end of the summer, to have weapons dominating the month of August. And let's not forget last year, Nosferatu. That movie opened on Christmas Day. And Nosferatu is an example of an Academy Award level horror film. And again, they used to not get any respect, but you go back to The Exorcist, Rosemary's Baby, considered some of the greatest movies of all time, full stop.

9:16You don't have to even qualify as horror movie. They're just great. So it's just really cool to have a genre like this really bolstering the box office. I mean, when you talk about a billion dollars in box office, the first time we ever hit that in domestic, meaning U.S. and Canada box office, was way back in 2017. The horror movie box office before then had never hit a billion dollars. But again, when you have It and Get Out and Split that year, all great movies. 1.16 billion. Again, not worldwide, but U.S. and Canada domestic gross. But right now in 2025, through the weekend of The Conjuring Last Rites, we're already at a billion, over a billion dollars, and more to come.

10:05Jonquilyn Hill:So these movies are big money, but why do we like them so much? And what other genre scratches that same itch? That's next.

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11:02Jonquilyn Hill:There have been a bunch of critically acclaimed horror movies in recent years. Get Out, Talk to Me, Weapons. What do they all have in common? They come from creators who originally got their start in comedy. So I asked Alison Wilmore, a film critic at Vulture and New York Magazine, to explain the connection between what frightens us and what makes us laugh. For me, the best horror comedies are both scary and funny. I also will say, I think that one of the great qualities of horror, as much as we associate it with being this, you know, it's a spooky genre. It's filled with a lot of dark things.

11:37It can be like really upsetting sometimes. I think that comedy is always paired really naturally with horror. Even in movies that are pretty straightforwardly horror, I think there's usually some room for intentional comedy. Or sometimes, if the movie's not going well, unintentional comedy. The one I always think about just in terms of like an early horror comedy is like there's Abbott and Costello meets Frankenstein. The nation's top comics, Abbott and Costello, petrified but hilariously. Like that was like back in the 1940s. So like even back then, you've got classic comedy duo meeting classic movie monster.

12:14In the spookiest laugh fest on record. Movies that are horror comedies, but that are also sort of about the kind of like tropes of horror, right? Like Shaun of the Dead is a zombie movie that is clearly made for and by people who actually, you know, have seen zombie movies, including the characters within it. Ah, get higher, baby. Ah, get higher, girl. Ah!

12:47We've all at this point become so familiar with a lot of the basic ideas about how horror movies work, right? The Scream movies are all just a riff on like what you should do or not do if you realize you are a character in a horror movie. Never, ever, ever under any circumstances say, I'll be right back. Because you won't be back. I'm getting another beer. You want one? Yeah, sure. I'll be right back.

13:11Jonquilyn Hill:Why do horror and comedy go so well together? You know, it feels like such an odd combination on its face. I know they do feel like they should be the opposites. But I think, one, I think they're both genres that have been considered a little disreputable. It's entertaining and it's something that goes back to like the earliest days of kind of telling stories for entertainment. But at the same time, we don't treat it as seriously as drama. You know, a lot of the same elements that go into making like a bit work or joke work also are what makes a scare work. Right. It's a question of like timing.

13:47It's a question of craft. It's a question of like landing that punchline or landing that jump scare, you know, kind of elaborate setups. And I think that that speaks to a certain kind of like shared spirit in both of those genres. And that's one of the reasons I think they fit so well together and people move back and forth between them.

14:06Jonquilyn Hill:Yeah, it's interesting you say that. I guess they both do sort of thrive on the unexpected. There's a sense of surprise with both comedy and with horror. Absolutely. And I think, you know, we think a lot about jump scares as trademark experiences of watching a horror movie. but I think that they also what do you do when you get a really good jump scare? I think you also laugh a bit you build up tension and then there's a release and I think that same thing happens with a joke as well

14:40Jonquilyn Hill:I think of some of our most buzzy horror creators right now I think of Jordan Peele of Get Out and Zach Kregor of Weapons they're comedians you know and I'm curious what you think about that crossover like why they are so good at getting those scares I think that it goes back to that kind of shared DNA of how you set up a scare and how you set up a joke being being very similar even if your aims are different in terms of like the the response you want from an audience and yeah you know I I mean When you mentioned those two, I was also just like looking around the director of Heart Eyes, you know, which is a movie that is both a riff on like slasher movies and romantic comedies.

15:29He's like Cupid with a kink. It was directed by Josh Rubin, who worked at College Humor. There's a pair of Australian brothers, the Phillibow brothers, who did that movie, talked to me about the kind of like hand that could let you see ghosts. Guys, the reception for the movie has been fucking crazy. All these directors that we've grown up loving are like reaching out to us personally. Jordan Peele, Ari Aster, Steven Spielberg, Stephen King wants to watch a fucking movie. And they got started on YouTube making like these kind of goofy sketches and videos for YouTube. So there is definitely a real trend there in terms of the kind of comedy to horror pathway.

16:11Something can be really frightening and also very kind of profound in its commentary. and also funny. And I love actually that mix. It's one of my favorite things about horror is that it can accommodate so many mixes of tones, I think maybe more so than any other genre. It's just this like incredible container for things that can be really weirdly touching, you know, or exploring grief. And then on the other side, like just kind of outrageous and funny and shocking and grotesque.

16:41Jonquilyn Hill:Yeah. It almost seems like it's the tofu of movie genres. Absolutely. It picks up the flavors of whatever it's cooked with. So the main focus of practically every horror movie is escaping death. And, you know, we got a few calls from listeners where people say, I've always been kind of an anxious person. And for me, engaging with horror gives me the chance to feel scared and feel anxious in a safe way. I'm in control. I can choose to turn off a movie and I can just walk away. It's like a safe environment to challenge myself without any real consequences of doing something in real life that I'm scared of.

17:28Jonquilyn Hill:I wonder what that says about us. Like the fact that this can be funny, the fact that this can be cathartic in a way. Yeah, I think it's something that very much appeals to an aspect of human nature. You know, we want to be able to sample, you know, the darkness, to sample the danger. But like, as you said, having it be in such a controlled environment, having it come in a way where you know that the credits are going to roll and then you get to go home. I'm of the age where blockbuster videos are still around and I would absolutely go and just like look at the covers of all of the horror movies.

18:05And some of them would get lodged in my brain and also still give me nightmares. But there's a reason that I think kids are also fascinated by, even if they're not ready for. And I think it's because we really like the ability to kind of like touch on these experiences, to kind of delve into them without putting ourselves in actual danger.

18:27Jonquilyn Hill:Coming up on Explain It To Me, how did we even get scary movies in the first place?

18:38Jonquilyn Hill:Andrew Stess Uless is an indie filmmaker and a film professor at DePaul University. I call him a film nerd, specifically a horror film nerd. So I had to know what his favorite is. So, you know, what is the first movie that scared the shit out of you? I think that's always the best way to approach talking about horror movies. But for me, it would have to be George Romero's Night of the Living Dead from 1968. That movie traumatized me. It damaged me. It did permanent damage to my psyche. The opening images, that stark black and white where they're in the graveyard and way off in the distance in the background, you see this form shuffling closer and closer to the camera.

19:25That is one of, I think, the best opening introductions of horror in any film.

19:39Jonquilyn Hill:How did we get the scary movie in America as we know it? It's a story that actually starts in another country over a century ago. Definitely right after World War I up to the early 1930s. For me, the German Expressionists really gave birth to what we, I think today, understand a horror film to be. German Expressionism is often marked visually by this, you know, very dark, very, you know, foreboding kind of lighting scheme. Lots of, like, high contrast shadows. You know, shadows are this kind of sublime delineation between, like, good and evil, you know, terror and safety and that sort of thing.

20:29But really, the first major, like, codification of the horror genre is born in Universal's Dracula. You are too late. My blood now flows through her veins.

20:47Jonquilyn Hill:Is that when we saw Hitchcock emerge? Well, Hitchcock has a long career. You know, Hitchcock starts in the silent era. And as a matter of fact, Hitchcock had an internship as a young film worker in Germany. Oh! With the German expressionists. But it's really, I think, 1960, with the release of Psycho, that Hitchcock, you know, once and for all, like, pushes film into an entirely new era. Here we have a quiet little motel, perfectly harmless looking, when in fact it has now become known as the scene of the crime. Psycho is a very important film. It's really, I think, one of the first major death nails for something like the Hollywood Production Code.

21:48For those who don't know, in the 1930s, Hollywood implemented the Hays Code, as it's sometimes known, the Production Code Administration. And this was a very restrictive, very conservative form of censorship that removed a lot of the explicit content that people started to panic about in the early 1930s. And this limited things that you could show on screen, violence, sex. But I think really Hitchcock in Psycho more or less was, you know, instrumental in bringing about its eventual demise. And so from like 1968 on, it's really just this parade of films and directors trying to outdo the next in terms of shocking the audiences.