It grossed $278 million worldwide back in 2000...adjusted for inflation that's $466 million in 2022.
For a spoof film! Hard to picture a film like this making anywhere near that kind of money these days.
Well, I think they kind of overdid it. There was a lot of sequels to Scary Movie. And then they did one for almost every other genre of movie too.
It perhaps felt less played out when this one came out.
I remember when this movie came out. I was one of the people who saw this movie in the theaters in 2000
1). The movie was well-marketed. I remember the commercials, showing Carmen Electra getting wet by the water sprinklers, the ‘Wassup’ skit, the Matrix slow-motion parody, and the Blair Witch snot scene
2). Movies like “Scream” and “I know what you did …” were still fresh in public memory
3). The Wayan Brothers were still kinda hot. Their TV show ended just one year prior, and the show was still getting aired on TV.
4). Although 2000 isn’t part of the 1990s, the attitude was still there. People were interested in material that pushed the envelope: it was the era of Eminem, Limp Bizkit, Kid Rock, Crash TV, America’s most Wanted, and Jerry Springer. Scary Movie, with its lewd jokes and edgy jokes, fit society
5). And lastly - the movie had originality. Spoof films have since gotten played out, but Scary Movie was the first of its kind. The only recognizable spoof movies before this one might have been films like Naked Gun, Airplane, and Austin Powers. And Scary Movie was so different from them. People went to see Scary Movie, not knowing what to expect
With Coolio passing, I looked up his filmography. Turns out he was in another Scream parody. And according to the IMDB page:
The film was originally intended to have a theatrical release. However, because of the big similarities with the much more popular Scary Movie (2000) (which was actually filmed after this film), it ended up being released direct to video. In the DVD's audio commentary, the actors refer to it as "that other movie" without ever saying the title.