Horror Box Office Flops That Are Hard To Watch Today

The horror genre has always been a lucrative one in Hollywood, but sometimes films will be released, fail to grip the public's imagination, and disappear into the ether in a matter of weeks. A number of those pictures bomb at the box office but later become cult classics, while others become ignominious failures that are hard to find on home media and in online archives.

The three movies listed below all have a few things in common: None of them made much money at the box office, all of them are horror movies, and all of them are completely unavailable on streaming services like Screambox or Shudder. Two were directed by heavy-hitting Hollywood megastars to be, but you'll have to work harder than the average horror fan to grab these beauties on websites like Amazon or other secondary DVD websites, because there's simply no other way to see them. Some have been kept from the light of day due to rights issues, while others are coping with problems regarding restoration. Which movies are they, and what's kept fans from reaching them for so long?

1977's "Martin" has an excellent pedigree, which makes its general unavailability a shock. It was directed and written by horror maven George A. Romero, and features both Tom Savini's makeup effects and on-screen charm. Regardless of its big names, "Martin" has been difficult to track down over the years. The last practical release of its theatrical cut was in 2023, it's completely unavailable to stream digitally, and the status of its director's cut is up in the air.

The movie centers on Martin Mathias (John Amplas), a young man who believes he's a vampire and commits multiple murders and rapes to keep himself fed. He moves in with his older cousin in Pennsylvania and tries to muffle his urges and desires. Mathias then falls in love and tries to make human connections, but is driven mad by his bloodlust.

"Martin" was only given a limited release by its distributor and thus became a box office flop, even though it had a modest $250,000 budget. But Romero's burgeoning reputation made it a thing of legend. A copy of the director's cut of "Martin" was discovered after years of being declared a lost film in 2021. It was later auctioned off and brought in over $51,000, but due to rights issues, it cannot be publicly shown. The George A. Romero Foundation has released a statement requesting the movie be returned to the director's archives at the University of Pittsburgh for preservation.

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There have been many versions of "The Phantom of the Opera" released over the years. Some have been more romantic in nature, and some have leaned harder into the tale's horror elements. This 1989 variation on Gaston Leroux's novel takes the former route.

Robert Englund stars as the musical and titular phantom, and the film is initially set in the modern world, setting it apart from its mask-sporting melodramatic brethren. Christine Day (Jill Schoelen) is a young opera singer who stumbles upon the sheet music for "Don Juan Triumphant," an opera penned by Erik Destler (Englund), a reported serial murderer who became obsessed with his divas. While performing Destler's piece at an audition, Christine is knocked unconscious and wakens in 1885 — and there, the real drama begins.

"Phantom" wasn't a hit like Englund's "A Nightmare on Elm Street" movies. It received negative reviews and drew little money, only grossing over $3 million domestically during a two-week theatrical run, which failed to make back its $6 million budget. It's currently hard to find on streaming, and its last DVD release occurred in 2015.  A planned sequel, which seemed to be less horrific and more romantic in nature, was cancelled because they couldn't gain access to the Toronto subway system for filming.

Peter Jackson might be better known these days for his poetic take on the "Lord of the Rings" series, but he got his start making goofy, gross horror movies and parodies that helped him get a foot into the door in Hollywood. Besides the darkly comic "Bad Taste" and his Muppets-mocking "Meet the Feebles," Jackson initially became known for the gore-splattered horror flick "Dead Alive" (or, as it was titled for its worldwide release, "Braindead"). While the film exists under two monikers thanks to a copyright issue, it's a singular experience — a flick whose humor and blood quotient gives "Evil Dead II" a run for its money.

Set on Skull Island, "Braindead" is the story of Lionel Cosgrove (Timothy Balme), a mousy man living under the thumb of his battle axe of a mother, Vera (Elizabeth Moody). Vera is bitten by an escaped rat-monkey while stalking Lionel's zoo date, and slowly turns into a zombie. Lionel frantically tries to conceal his mother's condition from the rest of the world, but she soon manages to infect a whole lot of people. Even though her brain has been all but liquified, Vera hopes to kill Paquita María Sánchez (Diana Peñalver), the girl whom Lionel has fallen in love with. Lionel will have to overcome his innate passiveness to find true love and finally put his mother's controlling nature behind him.

It only made over $200,000 on a $3 million budget in America, but has since become a horror film that bombed at the box office but still became a cult classic. While Jackson said in 2018 that "Dead Alive" would be remastered for re-release, you can't currently find it on any streaming service.