Focus Features and director Curry Barker's horror hit, Obsession, is taking the box office by storm. After an impressive $16 million debut, the movie took in $22 million in its second weekend in theatres and an estimated $28.2 million through the Monday holiday.
The R-rated film has now passed $80 million worldwide, and will likely become one of the only films in history to earn $100M+ on a budget of less than $1M.
If you haven't seen the movie yet, major spoilers from this point on.
Obsession has already become notorious for its most grisly and disturbing scene (most of the horror is psychological), which sees Nikki (Inde Navarrette) - who is not in control of her actions after being taken over by a mysterious entity - repeatedly smash her friend Sarah's (Megan Lawless) face into a brick until it turns to unrecognisable mush.
It's a shockingly gory moment as is, but Barker has now revealed the scene was originally even more taxing on the audience.
“There was about six or seven more smashes,” said the filmmaker (via Dread Central). “And we were getting an NC-17 rating. And so they were like, 'you’ve got to take out some of the smashes.' And I was like, 'I’m not taking out a single bash.' But I did.”
"It still feels really f**king hardcore,” he added. “I’d watch from the back of the theater and the way everyone reacted – whatever the number is now, it’s the right number."
Will the longer version of the scene ever see the light of day? Barker teased the possibility of a director's cut during a separate interview with Popternative.
“I would love to do a director’s cut of this just because there’s so many things that are not in the movie. That would be really fun. But it would literally be a project for me. I would have to set aside some time to really dive into the footage again. It would have to be something that Focus [Features] really wants and I would be like, ‘Yes, let’s do it.’”
As for a potential sequel, Barker says he is open to exploring the premise further, but doesn't expect to revisit these specific characters (to be fair, only Nikki survives).
“I don’t think you’ll ever see these characters again, but it would be cool to expand this world with different characters.”
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