Production Budget Analysis

What was the production budget for It Comes at Night?

Directed by Trey Edward Shults, with Joel Edgerton, Christopher Abbott, Carmen Ejogo leading the cast, It Comes at Night was produced by A24 with a confirmed budget of $5,000,000, placing it in the micro-budget category for drama films.

At $5,000,000, It Comes at Night was produced on a modest budget. Lower-budget films benefit from reduced break-even thresholds, with profitability achievable at approximately $12,500,000.

Budget Comparison — Similar Productions

• Come and See (1985): Budget $5,000,000 | Gross $20,929,648 → ROI: 319% • Cinema Paradiso (1988): Budget $5,000,000 | Gross $35,962,062 → ROI: 619% • Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters (1985): Budget $5,000,000 | Gross $502,758 → ROI: -90% • Once Upon a Time in the West (1968): Budget $5,000,000 | Gross $5,380,118 → ROI: 8% • A Separation (2011): Budget $5,000,000 | Gross $24,426,169 → ROI: 389%

Key Budget Allocation Categories

▸ Above-the-Line Talent Drama films live or die on the strength of their performances. Securing award-caliber actors and experienced directors represents the single largest budget line item, often consuming 30–40% of the total production budget.

▸ Location Filming & Period Production Design Authentic locations — whether contemporary or historical — require scouting, permits, travel, lodging, and often significant dressing to match the story's time period. Period dramas add the cost of era-accurate props, vehicles, and set decoration.

▸ Post-Production, Color Grading & Score The editorial process for dramas is typically longer than genre films, with careful attention to pacing and tone. Color grading, a nuanced musical score, and detailed sound mixing are critical to achieving the emotional resonance that defines the genre.

Key Production Personnel

CAST: Joel Edgerton, Christopher Abbott, Carmen Ejogo, Riley Keough, Kelvin Harrison Jr. Key roles: Joel Edgerton as Paul; Christopher Abbott as Will; Carmen Ejogo as Sarah; Riley Keough as Kim

DIRECTOR: Trey Edward Shults CINEMATOGRAPHY: Drew Daniels MUSIC: Brian McOmber EDITING: Matthew Hannam, Trey Edward Shults PRODUCTION: A24, Animal Kingdom FILMED IN: United States of America

Box Office Performance

It Comes at Night earned $19,280,931 in worldwide box office revenue.

Break-Even Analysis

Using the industry-standard 2.5x multiplier (P&A + exhibitor shares of 40–50% + distribution fees), It Comes at Night needed approximately $12,500,000 to break even. The film surpassed this threshold by $6,780,931.

Return on Investment (ROI)

Revenue: $19,280,931 Budget: $5,000,000 Net: $14,280,931 ROI: 285.6%

Profitability Assessment

VERDICT: Profitable

It Comes at Night delivered a solid return, earning $19,280,931 worldwide on a $5,000,000 budget (286% ROI). Combined with ancillary revenue, the film was a financial positive for A24.

INDUSTRY IMPACT

The outsized success of It Comes at Night likely influenced studio greenlight decisions for similar drama projects.

PRODUCTION NOTES

▸ Production

Shults began writing the film after the death of his father as a way of dealing with the pain. Although the film is post-apocalyptic Shults did not look to any other such films as inspiration; instead, he cited the work of Paul Thomas Anderson and John Cassavetes and the films Night of the Living Dead and The Shining as inspirations. To the later point, the film takes some influences from The Shinings Overlook Hotel in that the layout of the house is deliberately vague and never properly established. Shults has described it "as this kind of labyrinth" and a metaphor for "the mesh of Travis' head".

In June 2016, Joel Edgerton joined the cast of the film. In August 2016, it was announced that Christopher Abbott, Riley Keough and Carmen Ejogo had also joined the cast.

▸ Filming & Locations

Principal photography began in August 2016 in New York.

[Filming] Principal photography began in August 2016 in New York.

AWARDS & RECOGNITION

Additional Recognition: Kelvin Harrison Jr. was nominated for Breakthrough Actor at the Gotham Independent Film Awards 2017.

CRITICAL RECEPTION

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 88% based on 257 reviews, with an average rating of 7.4/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "It Comes at Night makes lethally effective use of its bare-bones trappings while proving once again that what's left unseen can be just as horrifying as anything on the screen." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score 78 out of 100, based on 43 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "D" on an A+ to F scale. Mark Kermode wrote in The Observer, "there are no bad guys here – just suspicion, isolation and contagion. It's a grim vision of a world losing track of objective facts, descending into a poisonous abyss of chaos and disorder. No wonder it strikes such a contemporary chord." He gave the film 4/5 stars. The Times Ed Potton also gave it 4/5 stars, writing, "The 'It' of the title refers to the contagious disease that has devastated the outside world (a world that, like much in this beautifully minimalist film, we never see), but it also denotes something even more virulent and destructive: human fear." David Sims of The Atlantic called it "A fairly straightforward post-apocalyptic story, tightly focused on human torment, but suffused with surprising, undeniably atmospheric sights and sounds."

Vanity Fair's Richard Lawson was more critical, writing, "without exploring the fullness of the world he's made, all Shults can do is try to shock us with brutality. Which, sadly, doesn't shock anymore so much as it exhausts us... To my mind, It Comes at Night traffics in a fatally depthless cruelty." Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote, "It is not unreasonable for an audience to be interested in these questions when our interest is generated by the film itself.