“Paranormal Activity”

Budget: $15,000

Revenue: $193.3 million

Paranormal Activity has the lowest budget on our list and is considered to be the most profitable film ever made. The independent film was directed, written, produced, and even edited by Oren Peli. Like The Blair Witch Project, Paranormal Activity is ostensibly a found footage film. After its film festival success, the movie was picked up by Paramount Pictures, and released nationwide in October of 2009.

The film follows the disintegration of the household of a young couple, Katie and Micah. Katie has become convinced that the house contains an evil spirit. Micah considers this to be somewhat humorous, but sets up a video camera to record anything that might take place while they’re sleeping. The camera records a number of relatively mild events, including doors opening and shutting independently, flickering lights, and the like. However, things escalate quickly, with Katie entering a trance state.

Micah continues to test the limits of Katie’s patience with a Ouija board; it ends up moving on its own and then spontaneously combusting. Micah still insists that they don’t need the help of the demonologist that Katie so desperately wants to call. His reticence will be his undoing.

One reason for the film’s low production costs is the fact that Peli, wishing to make the “found footage” as realistic as possible, shot the film with a home video camera. He also utilized the improvisation method that the Blair Witch Project so successfully debuted. The actors were given daily cues, which they could not share with one another. The actors were initially only paid $500 apiece. The entire film was shot over the course of a single week.

Dreamworks acquired the film. At its test screening, audience members began to leave. At first, Dreamworks thought it was because the movie was terrible—it turned out, however, that it was just that frightening.