We Have a Ghost Budget

What Is the Budget of We Have a Ghost (2023)?

We Have a Ghost (2023), written and directed by Christopher Landon and adapted from Geoff Manaugh's 2017 BLDGBLOG short story Ernest, was produced on an estimated budget of approximately $40,000,000. The figure has not been formally disclosed by Netflix or producer Temple Hill Entertainment, but the marquee David Harbour and Anthony Mackie pay-scale, the Christopher Landon director rate following the Happy Death Day and Freaky successes, the extensive visual-effects-heavy ghost-comedy template, and the multi-state production footprint all support a figure in the high-$30M to mid-$40M range.

The film was financed and produced by Temple Hill Entertainment, with Netflix as global distributor. Marty Bowen produced through Temple Hill alongside Isaac Klausner and Dan Halsted. Netflix released the film globally on February 24, 2023.

Key Budget Allocation Categories

The estimated $40,000,000 budget covered a family-supernatural-comedy with substantial visual-effects requirements:

• Above-the-Line Talent: David Harbour anchored as Ernest the ghost at a marquee post-Stranger Things and post-Black Widow rate. Anthony Mackie took the Frank Presley role at a post-Falcon and the Winter Soldier marquee rate. Jahi Di'Allo Winston anchored as Kevin Presley. Erica Ash, Niles Fitch, Isabella Russo, Tig Notaro, and Tom Bower filled out the supporting ensemble at established-supporting and lead-supporting rates.
• Writer-Director Package: Christopher Landon wrote and directed at a post-Happy Death Day, post-Freaky, and post-Happy Death Day 2U Blumhouse-graduated horror-comedy-director rate. The single writer-director package consolidated above-the-line spend.
• Visual Effects: The Ernest-the-ghost character required visual-effects compositing across virtually the entire film, including transparency effects, intangibility-through-walls sequences, levitation, and the third-act ghost-investigation set-pieces. The VFX package was the single largest below-the-line line item.
• Atlanta and Louisiana Production: Principal photography took place across Georgia (primarily Atlanta and the surrounding region) and Louisiana during 2021. The Georgia 30% transferable production tax credit at the base-and-uplift level and the Louisiana Motion Picture Investor Tax Credit supported the multi-state location footprint.
• Cinematography: Director of photography Marc Spicer shot the film with a warm, slightly stylized register that supported the supernatural-comedy tone. The lighting design for the Ernest-the-ghost ethereal-presence sequences was a substantial cinematography line item.
• Production Design: The Presley-family-house production design, the attic-ghost-discovery sequences, the road-trip sequences across multiple regional environments, and the third-act ghost-investigation-facility set were substantial production-design line items.
• Score: Composer Bear McCreary scored the film, supporting the supernatural-comedy tone with a hybrid orchestral and electronic score. McCreary's profile after Battlestar Galactica, The Walking Dead, and Outlander supported a substantial composer fee.

How Does We Have a Ghost's Budget Compare to Similar Films?

We Have a Ghost sits in the Netflix family-supernatural-comedy landscape alongside comparable streamer and theatrical peers:

• Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021): Budget approximately $75,000,000 | Worldwide $204,800,000. Jason Reitman's Sony theatrical Ghostbusters-franchise legacy-sequel at nearly double the We Have a Ghost budget represents the studio-tentpole supernatural-family peer.
• Freaky (2020): Budget approximately $6,000,000 | Worldwide $16,200,159. Christopher Landon's previous Blumhouse-Universal supernatural-comedy at a fraction of the We Have a Ghost budget represents the director's smaller-budget previous work.
• Happy Death Day 2U (2019): Budget approximately $9,000,000 | Worldwide $64,500,000. Christopher Landon's previous Blumhouse-Universal time-loop-comedy sequel at modest budget represents another director-prior peer.
• The Christmas Chronicles (2018): Budget approximately $40,000,000 | Worldwide Netflix release. Clay Kaytis's Netflix Kurt Russell family-supernatural-fantasy at identical budget represents the closest Netflix family-supernatural-tentpole peer.

We Have a Ghost Box Office Performance

We Have a Ghost released globally on Netflix on February 24, 2023. As a streaming-exclusive release with no theatrical window, the film did not generate reported domestic or international box office.

Against the estimated $40,000,000 production budget, the financial breakdown:

• Production Budget: approximately $40,000,000
• Estimated Prints & Advertising (P&A): approximately $15,000,000 to $20,000,000
• Total Estimated Investment: approximately $55,000,000 to $60,000,000
• Worldwide Gross: not applicable (streaming exclusive)
• Net Return: measured through Netflix subscriber engagement during the February to March 2023 launch window
• ROI: reported by Netflix as a top-ten English-language film in its launch window

Netflix reported We Have a Ghost as a top-ten English-language film during its February 2023 launch week and Netflix's published Top 10 tracking reported the film at more than 56 million hours viewed across its first two weeks of streaming availability.

The strong family-and-young-adult subscriber engagement reinforced the value of Christopher Landon's continuing relationship with the streamer and supported Netflix's ongoing investment in mid-budget family-supernatural-comedy production.

We Have a Ghost Production History

We Have a Ghost originated as Geoff Manaugh's 2017 BLDGBLOG short story Ernest, a contained character piece about a family that discovers a sad ghost in their new house and turns him into a social-media phenomenon. Christopher Landon, post-Happy Death Day, post-Happy Death Day 2U, and post-Freaky at Blumhouse-Universal, optioned the rights and wrote the feature-screenplay adaptation himself.

Temple Hill Entertainment financed and produced through Marty Bowen, Isaac Klausner, and Dan Halsted. Netflix acquired the project as a Netflix Original. The casting added marquee value: David Harbour as Ernest the ghost following Stranger Things, Anthony Mackie as Frank Presley following his Marvel Cinematic Universe work, and Jahi Di'Allo Winston as the central teenage character Kevin Presley following Charm City Kings.

Principal photography took place across Georgia (primarily Atlanta and the surrounding region) and Louisiana during 2021. The Georgia 30% transferable production tax credit at the base-and-uplift level and the Louisiana Motion Picture Investor Tax Credit supported the multi-state location footprint. Netflix released the film globally on February 24, 2023, positioning the family-supernatural-comedy across the late-winter family-streaming window.

Awards and Recognition

We Have a Ghost received Saturn Award attention from the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films with multiple nominations including Best Streaming Fantasy / Horror Film and Best Performance by a Younger Actor in a Film (Jahi Di'Allo Winston). The film also drew Astra Award nominations and appeared on multiple year-end Best Streaming Family Films of 2023 critic lists.

Critical Reception

We Have a Ghost received mixed reviews. The film holds a 41% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on more than 100 critic reviews, with a critical consensus that praised David Harbour's silent ghost performance and the central father-son emotional through-line, but expressed substantial reservations about the screenplay's tonal whiplash and the runtime length. Metacritic recorded a score of 40 out of 100, indicating mixed-to-negative reviews. CinemaScore did not poll the film given its streaming-exclusive release.

Critics broadly praised David Harbour for an entirely non-verbal performance as Ernest the ghost that anchored the film emotionally, and Jahi Di'Allo Winston for a sincere lead performance. Variety wrote that David Harbour "delivers a silent-physical performance of unexpected emotional precision that anchors the film's strongest sequences," but called the screenplay "two films awkwardly stitched together: a tender father-son ghost-comedy and a generic third-act CIA chase movie." The New York Times praised Christopher Landon's direction but called the screenplay "a charming first act, a frustrating third act." Common reservations cited the 127-minute runtime and the genre-shift in the final third. Despite the mixed reception, the Netflix subscriber engagement supported the streamer's continued investment in mid-budget family-supernatural-comedy programming.