2026’s Most Surprising Blockbuster Release Could Have Been a Straight-to-Netflix Movie, Director Reveals

2026’s Most Surprising Blockbuster Release Could Have Been a Straight-to-Netflix Movie, Director Reveals

Obsession almost became another Netflix streaming release before Focus Features stepped into the heated bidding battle.

Curry Barker Says Netflix Tried To Buy ‘Obsession’ With A Straight-To-Streaming Offer & Reveals ‘The Chair’ Was Almost His Feature Debut

A year after “Obsession” became one of the biggest horror success stories in recent memory, Curry Barker is still filling in some surprising pieces of how the film came together. That includes a previously undisclosed offer from Netflix to take the movie straight to streaming and the fact that Barker came remarkably close to making a feature-length version of his viral short “The Chair” instead. Continue reading Curry Barker Says Netflix Tried T…

Curry Barker Reveals Netflix Wanted to Take 'Obsession' Straight to Streaming Before Focus Features Won It

Few horror films have had a rise quite like ‘Obsession,’ the micro-budget breakout that turned director Curry Barker into one of the industry’s most sought-after new voices practically overnight. What started as a modest festival entry quickly became one of the genre’s biggest success stories in recent memory. That kind of trajectory rarely happens without...

Netflix Almost Buried ‘Obsession’ on Streaming Before It Became Horror’s Biggest Surprise

At this point, it’s almost impossible to picture Curry Barker’s ‘Obsession’ as anything other than a big-screen event. The YouTube-born horror hit turned a tiny indie production into a box office juggernaut, and it went on to become the first original film released in the 2020s to pass the $500 million mark worldwide. But as...

Curry Barker Says Netflix Wanted Straight-to-Streaming for ‘Obsession’ Before Focus Won the Bidding War

A year after “Obsession” became one of the biggest horror success stories in recent memory, Curry Barker is still spilling details about how it all came together. The two big ones: Netflix wanted to skip theaters entirely, and Barker came very close to making a feature version of his viral short “The Chair” instead.Barker sat down with Tom Power on CBC’s “Q,” and recalled waking up the morning after the film’s TIFF premiere to missed calls from …