10 Horror Movies You Never Knew Spawned A Trilogy
6. Cabin Fever
Modern horror icon Eli Roth made his directorial debut with Cabin Fever back in 2002, and it made quite the splash. Despite trying to get the movie off the ground for years, and being turned away time and time again, Roth struck box office gold. On a budget of $1.5 million, the movie grossed a very respectable $30 million, so it didn't matter if the critics didn't think much of it. Especially not to the producers, whose eyes would have been rolling dollar signs at the numbers.
The path to a sequel also wouldn't be that hard, as the end of the movie perfectly sets up some sort of sequel. Long story short for the uninitiated, Cabin Fever has a group of young adults holidaying at a cabin in the woods, only to become infected by some unknown contagious disease. It transpires that the water being supplied to the cabin from a nearby water source is blighted by a flesh eating bacteria. High quality H2O this is not. One by one the characters die or are killed off, only for the movie to end with infected bottle water being given to residents of the town, which is more or less where the sequel picks up.
Ti West, a burgeoning horror director at the time, took the reins from Eli Roth for Cabin Fever 2 before completely disavowing the movie due to studio and producer interference. Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever (How many times do you need Fever in the movie title?) ended up with a disappointing 4.3 on IMDb. It's the kind of critical response that usually ends any efforts to produce a follow-up. Not in Cabin Fever's case, as a prequel called Cabin Fever: Patient Zero found its way to DVD in 2014, letting us know how this series of movies all began. The only thing this third movie has going for it is the presence of Sean Astin, and even then it's a questionable watch.