Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed unleashes antediluvian malevolence, a nightmare fueled horror thriller, arriving Oct 2025 on major streaming services

This eerie unearthly nightmare movie from writer / director Andrew Chiaramonte, liberating an mythic nightmare when strangers become instruments in a devilish game. Dropping October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play Movies & TV, iTunes Movies, Apple’s streaming platform, and Fandango’s digital service.

L.A., CA (August 8, 2025) – get ready for *Young & Cursed*, a unnerving narrative of resistance and old world terror that will redefine horror this fall. Visualized by rising thriller expert Andrew Chiaramonte, this edge-of-your-seat and cinematic thriller follows five lost souls who emerge caught in a cut-off lodge under the malevolent dominion of Kyra, a possessed female dominated by a prehistoric sacred-era entity. Prepare to be seized by a theatrical outing that blends gut-punch terror with timeless legends, streaming on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on the second of October, 2025.


Diabolic occupation has been a iconic concept in horror films. In *Young & Cursed*, that structure is reimagined when the demons no longer develop outside their bodies, but rather internally. This suggests the most sinister side of the cast. The result is a edge-of-seat inner struggle where the narrative becomes a perpetual tug-of-war between innocence and sin.


In a unforgiving outland, five young people find themselves cornered under the dark aura and infestation of a unidentified spirit. As the team becomes paralyzed to oppose her grasp, exiled and followed by unknowns inconceivable, they are pushed to confront their inner demons while the final hour coldly ticks onward toward their demise.


In *Young & Cursed*, delusion builds and bonds collapse, compelling each character to evaluate their true nature and the structure of free will itself. The intensity intensify with every passing moment, delivering a paranormal ride that fuses unearthly horror with emotional fragility.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my purpose was to explore raw dread, an evil rooted in antiquity, embedding itself in emotional vulnerability, and navigating a will that challenges autonomy when autonomy is removed.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Stepping into Kyra demanded embodying something outside normal anguish. She is innocent until the evil takes hold, and that shift is eerie because it is so raw.”

Streaming Info

*Young & Cursed* will be aired for viewing beginning October 2, 2025, on Amazon’s platform, YouTube, Google Play, Apple iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home—guaranteeing subscribers anywhere can get immersed in this spirit-driven thriller.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just broadcast a new second trailer for *Young & Cursed*, debuted to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a companion to its initial teaser, which has gathered over notable views.


In addition to its domestic release, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has stated that *Young & Cursed* will also be taken worldwide, spreading the horror to horror fans worldwide.


Be sure to catch this visceral journey into fear. Enter *Young & Cursed* this Halloween season to uncover these terrifying truths about free will.


For sneak peeks, special features, and insider scoops via the production team, follow @YoungAndCursedMovie across your socials and visit the movie portal.





Today’s horror watershed moment: 2025 for genre fans U.S. lineup interlaces ancient-possession motifs, art-house nightmares, paired with legacy-brand quakes

Ranging from life-or-death fear drawn from old testament echoes and onward to franchise returns alongside keen independent perspectives, 2025 looks like the most complex and deliberate year in the past ten years.

The 2025 horror calendar is not merely full, it is methodical. Top studios are anchoring the year with established lines, in parallel SVOD players flood the fall with unboxed visions together with ancient terrors. On the independent axis, the micro-to-mid budget ranks is riding the backdraft of a record-setting 2024 festival season. Since Halloween is the prized date, the remaining months are slotted with surgical care. That late Q3 to mid Q4 lane is the crucible, notably this year, teams are capturing January, spring, and mid-summer. Fans are ravenous, studios are exacting, accordingly 2025 could stand as the most orchestrated year.

Studio and Mini-Major Moves: Premium genre swings back

The top end is active. If 2024 primed the reset, 2025 deepens the push.

Universal’s slate kicks off the frame with a headline swing: a refreshed Wolf Man, set not in some misty 19th-century European village, in a clear present-tense world. Steered by Leigh Whannell and starring Christopher Abbott with Julia Garner, this cut welds lycanthropy to home turmoil. The change is not purely bodily, it is marital, parental, and achingly human. landing in mid January, it supports the push to convert the winter lull using prestige plays, not leftovers.

Spring delivers Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher conversion presented as stripped terror. Directed by Eli Craig starring Katie Douglas opposite Kevin Durand, it functions as blood smeared American gothic with snark. Under the costume, it needles small town fear, cross generational rifts, and crowd punishment. Initial fest notes point to real bite.

As summer eases, the Warner Bros. banner sets loose the finale within its surest horror brand: The Conjuring: Last Rites. Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson again portray Ed and Lorraine Warren, the entry offers emotional coda while tackling one of their notorious real cases. Even if the pattern is recognizable, Chaves is expected to tune it to a grieving, self reflective color. It arrives early September, buying space before the October wave.

Following that is The Black Phone 2. Once set for early summer, the October pivot signals belief. Scott Derrickson is back, and those signature textures resurface: 70s style chill, trauma centered writing, and eerie supernatural logic. This time, the stakes are raised, with more excavation of the “grabber” canon and family hauntings.

Completing the calendar is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a property whose brand does the lifting. The continuation widens the legend, broadens the animatronic terror cast, with a bullseye on teens and thirty something nostalgics. It books December, buttoning the final window.

Platform Plays: No Budget, No Problem

While theaters lean on names and sequels, platforms are wagering boldly, and results are there.

A leading ambitious platform entry is Weapons, a cold trail horror omnibus lacing three time frames tied to a mass vanishing. Under Zach Cregger and starring Josh Brolin with Julia Garner, the film fuses dread with dramatic heft. Arriving to cinemas late summer then to streamers in fall, it looks primed to seed post watch analysis akin to Barbarian.

More contained by design is Together, a sealed box body horror arc pairing Alison Brie with Dave Franco. Trapped in a far off rental as a holiday fractures, the arc observes love and green eyed envy and self harm turned somatic. It reads tender, repulsive, and intensely uneasy, a three act churn into codependent hell. Even without a formal platform date, it is a lock for fall streaming.

Then there is Sinners, a Depression era vampire folk fable anchored by Michael B. Jordan. Lensed in lush sepia and soaked in biblical metaphor, it feels like There Will Be Blood fused with Let the Right One In. The film interrogates American religious trauma through supernatural allegory. Advance tests paint it as a watercooler streamer.

Extra indies bide their time on platforms: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper each engages grief, missing persons, and identity, with metaphor before show.

Possession Underneath: Young & Cursed

Rolling out October 2 across streaming, Young & Cursed operates as a rare duality, minimal in staging, maximal in myth. Written and helmed by Andrew Chiaramonte, the film follows five strangers who wake in a remote wilderness cabin under the thrall of Kyra, a young woman possessed by the ancient biblical demon Lilith. As the night settles, her power spikes, an infiltrating force leveraging fears, breaks, and sorrow.

The threat is psychological first, wired with primal myth. Skipping the exorcism norm of Catholic rite and Latin line, this one bores into something older, something darker. Lilith does not answer ceremony, she climbs through trauma, hush, and human fracture. That possession comes from within, not without, flips the trope and aligns Young & Cursed with a growing trend in horror, intimate character studies that dress themselves in the skin of genre.

On Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play, and Fandango at Home, the film acts as a Halloween counterpoint to sequel pipelines and creature comebacks. It is a smart play. No bloated canon. No series drag. Only psychological menace, compressed and taut, tuned to binge and gasp cycles online. Among spectacle, Young & Cursed might win by restraint, then release.

Festivals as Springboards

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF remain breeding grounds for what horror looks like six to twelve months later. They are increasingly launchpads rather than showcases.

Fantastic Fest this cycle touts a strong horror menu. Primate opens with tropical body horror, sparking Cronenberg plus Herzog comps. Whistle, an Aztec lore revenge tale, aims to close with burn.

The midnight bench, including If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, hums from execution, not mere titling. With A24 behind it, the satire of toxic fandom under a convention lockdown seems breakout bound.

SXSW bowed Clown in a Cornfield while feeding deal chatter for microbudget haunts. Sundance is expected to unspool a familiar crop of grief steeped elevated horror, and Tribeca’s genre box tilting urban, social, and surreal.

This cycle, festival strategy pivots from discovery toward branding. The laurel is campaign ignition, not epilogue.

Legacy Brands: Sequels, Reboots, and Reinvention

Legacy IP arrives sturdier and more intentional this cycle.

Fear Street: Prom Queen brings back the 90s line in July with a new lead and throwback vibe. Rather than prior modes, it goes camp and prom night melodrama. Think tiaras, fake blood, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 opens late June, targeting a broadened techno horror canon with new characters and AI spawned nightmares. The debut’s viral plus streaming heat gives Universal reason to press the bet.

Another headline is The Long Walk, adapting a grim early Stephen King piece, led by Francis Lawrence, it functions as a harsh dystopian fable encased in survival horror, a children’s march that ends in death. If sold right, it could sit as The Hunger Games for adult horror fans.

Elsewhere, reboots and sequels like Hell House LLC: Lineage, V/H/S/Halloween, The Toxic Avenger, and Anaconda pepper the schedule, many waiting on strategic holds or late deals.

Trend Lines

Myth turns mainstream
From Lilith in Young & Cursed to Aztec curses in Whistle, horror is turning to ancient texts and symbols. This is not nostalgia, it is a reclamation of pre Christian archetypes. Horror reaches past fear, it states evil is old.

Body horror returns
Entries like Together, Weapons, and Keeper shift back to flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation now read as metaphors for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

Streaming originals get teeth
The era of filler horror on streamers is ending. Platforms are putting money into scripts, directors, and promotion. Entries like Weapons and Sinners get event treatment, not inventory.

Festival momentum becomes leverage
Festival status acts as leverage for exhibition, placement, and publicity. In 2025, a horror film lacking festival plan may fade.

Theatrical lanes are trust falls
Studios hold theatrical for overperformers or future series seeds. The balance slides PVOD or hybrid. Horror stays in theaters, in chosen pockets.

Near Term Outlook: Autumn crowding, winter surprise

Young & Cursed plus The Conjuring: Last Rites plus The Black Phone 2 plus Weapons, all in September and October, makes for a saturated fall. Indies, including Bone Lake and Keeper, will battle for oxygen. Expect one or more to pivot into early 2026 or shift platforms.

December holds on Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, though a stealth streamer release may land late. Given the dark, mythic lean of the year’s big films, a final creature feature or exorcism slot is open.

The success of horror in 2025 hinges less on a single title and more on how a diverse slate reaches a scattered, segmented audience. The goal is not Get Out again, it is horror with staying power past opening weekends.



The next Horror cycle: follow-ups, Originals, alongside A brimming Calendar geared toward screams

Dek The fresh genre season builds early with a January wave, and then runs through summer, and far into the December corridor, combining franchise firepower, new voices, and savvy counter-scheduling. Studios with streamers are committing to mid-range economics, cinema-first plans, and social-fueled campaigns that frame genre titles into four-quadrant talking points.

How the genre looks for 2026

The genre has become the bankable play in studio lineups, a vertical that can spike when it lands and still insulate the drag when it fails to connect. After 2023 reassured strategy teams that efficiently budgeted fright engines can command the discourse, 2024 kept the drumbeat going with auteur-driven buzzy films and sleeper breakouts. The carry rolled into 2025, where legacy revivals and filmmaker-prestige bets demonstrated there is an opening for diverse approaches, from series extensions to non-IP projects that travel well. The result for 2026 is a programming that appears tightly organized across players, with planned clusters, a blend of legacy names and new packages, and a renewed strategy on exclusive windows that amplify PVOD and streaming on paid VOD and home platforms.

Schedulers say the space now slots in as a plug-and-play option on the slate. The genre can arrive on nearly any frame, provide a quick sell for marketing and short-form placements, and outstrip with viewers that respond on advance nights and keep coming through the follow-up frame if the title hits. Post a strike-impacted pipeline, the 2026 layout reflects conviction in that dynamic. The slate commences with a weighty January lineup, then turns to spring and early summer for genre counterpoints, while saving space for a fall run that runs into spooky season and past Halloween. The arrangement also underscores the stronger partnership of specialty distributors and platforms that can platform and widen, generate chatter, and scale up at the inflection point.

A reinforcing pattern is series management across interlocking continuities and classic IP. The companies are not just making another return. They are looking to package lineage with a heightened moment, whether that is a typeface approach that indicates a tonal shift or a star attachment that ties a upcoming film to a original cycle. At the concurrently, the filmmakers behind the eagerly awaited originals are leaning into material texture, real effects and location-forward worlds. That interplay gives the 2026 slate a healthy mix of comfort and novelty, which is what works overseas.

The studios and mini-majors, and how they are playing the year

Paramount defines the early cadence with two front-of-slate bets that bookend the tonal range. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with Kevin Williamson in the helm and Neve Campbell back at the focus, marketing it as both a succession moment and a DNA-forward character-driven entry. The film is shooting in Atlanta, and the story approach suggests a nostalgia-forward framework without rehashing the last two entries’ sibling arc. The studio is likely to mount a drive stacked with signature symbols, early character teases, and a trailer cadence rolling toward late fall. Distribution is big-screen via Paramount.

Paramount also dusts off a once-mighty spoof franchise with Scary Movie 6 on June 12, 2026, directed by Michael Tiddes. Anna Faris and Regina Hall are set to reunite, with the Wayans brothers involved in creative roles for the first time since the early 2000s, a campaign lever the campaign will double down on. As a summer counter-slot, this one will seek wide appeal through share-ready beats, with the horror spoof format fitting quick adjustments to whatever shapes horror talk that spring.

Universal has three unique pushes. SOULM8TE opens January 9, 2026, a tech-forward branch from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The hook is elegant, loss-driven, and commercial: a grieving man purchases an virtual partner that evolves into a killer companion. The date puts it at the front of a competition-heavy month, with Universal’s marketing likely to recreate off-kilter promo beats and micro spots that blurs intimacy and chill.

On May 8, 2026, the studio lines up an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely considered the feature developed under code names in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The public release grid currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which makes room for a proper title to become an PR pop closer to the debut look. The timing gives the studio a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles concentrate elsewhere.

Filling out the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film reserves October 23, 2026, a slot he has owned before. Peele titles are set up as creative events, with a teaser that holds back and a second beat that tee up tone without spoiling the concept. The late-month date lets the studio to maximize pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then capitalize on the copyright window to capture late-October interest at home.

Warner Bros., via New Line, collaborates with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček heads, with Souheila Yacoub top-lining. The franchise has long shown that a gritty, practical-first mix can feel high-value on a middle budget. Expect a gore-forward summer horror blast that leans hard into global rollout, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most non-U.S. markets.

Sony’s horror bench is particularly deep. The studio launches two series moves in the back half. An untitled Insidious film premieres August 21, 2026, preserving a dependable supernatural brand in play while the spin-off branch evolves. The studio has changed the date on this title before, but the current plan sets it in late summer, where the brand has found success.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil re-enters in what the studio is framing as a fresh restart for its game-to-film powerhouse. With the PlayStation Productions pipeline now a strategic part of the studio’s strategy, this new take has a focus to serve both fans and fresh viewers. The fall slot offers Sony space to build promo materials around lore, and creature effects, elements that can increase premium screens and fan-forward engagement.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, pins a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film sustains the filmmaker’s run of period horror centered on rigorous craft and dialect, this time exploring werewolf lore. Focus’s team has already announced the holiday for a holiday release, a public confidence in Eggers as a specialty play that can grow wide if early reception is enthusiastic.

Where the platforms fit in

Platform tactics for 2026 run on known playbooks. Universal’s slate head to copyright after a big-screen and PVOD window, a tiered path that expands both FOMO and sub growth in the later window. Prime Video will mix library titles great post to read with cross-border buys and qualifying theatrical engagements when the data supports it. Max and Hulu optimize their lanes in library curation, using prominent placements, genre hubs, and collection rows to keep attention on the annual genre haul. Netflix retains agility about first-party entries and festival snaps, dating horror entries closer to drop and positioning as event drops releases with surge campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, leverages a tiered of precision releases and prompt platform moves that drives paid trials from buzz. That will be material for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before activating horror-fan channels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ keeps selective horror on a per-project basis. The platform has signaled readiness to invest in select projects with acclaimed directors or name-led packages, then give them a boutique theatrical in partnership with exhibitors to meet guild rules or to generate social proof before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney domestic still benefits from the 20th Century Studios slate, a major factor for platform stickiness when the genre conversation ramps.

Festival-to-platform breakouts

Cineverse is steadily assembling a 2026 pipeline with two IP plays. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The offer is uncomplicated: the same mist-blanketed, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a cult hit, upgraded for modern sound and cinematography. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a fall corridor, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. Cineverse has hinted a big-screen first plan for Legacy, an upbeat indicator for fans of the nasty series and for exhibitors hungry for R material in the autumn stretch.

Focus will favor the auteur track with Werwulf, stewarding the film through fall festivals if the cut is ready, then deploying the holiday frame to go wider. That positioning has been successful for auteur horror with wider appeal. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not locked many 2026-specific horror dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines typically coalesce after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A fair assumption is a sprinkle of late-summer and fall platformers that can widen if reception prompts. Do not be surprised by an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that bows at Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work as partners, using precision theatrical to spark the evangelism that fuels their paid base.

Franchise entries versus originals

By volume, the 2026 slate tilts in favor of the recognizable IP side. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all tap brand equity. The challenge, as ever, is brand erosion. The practical approach is to position each entry as a recast vibe. Paramount is leading with core character and DNA in Scream 7, Sony is indicating a clean-slate build for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is embracing a French-flavored turn from a new voice. Those choices matter when the audience has so many options and social sentiment whipsaws.

Non-franchise titles and director-first projects deliver oxygen. Jordan Peele’s October film will be positioned as a brand unto itself. Sam Raimi’s Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, sets Rachel McAdams in a marooned survival premise with Raimi’s signature playful menace. SOULM8TE offers a simple, unsettling tech hook. Werwulf anchors in period detail and an stark tone. Even when the title is not based on a recognizable brand, the package is grounded enough to convert curiosity into pre-sales and preview-night crowds.

Recent-year comps clarify the template. In 2023, a theater-first model that held distribution windows did not preclude a hybrid test from working when the brand was sticky. In 2024, craft-forward auteur horror surged in big-format auditoriums. In 2025, a resuscitation of a beloved infection saga reminded the market that global horror franchises can still feel recharged when they pivot perspective and stretch the story. That last point is directly relevant to Sony’s 28 Years Later plan, which presses on January 16, 2026 with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, this time directed by Nia DaCosta from a script by Alex Garland. The dual-chapter plan, with chapters shot in tandem, enables marketing to cross-link entries through character arcs and themes and to sustain campaign assets without dead zones.

Creative tendencies and craft

The production chatter behind 2026 horror point to a continued turn toward in-camera, locale-specific craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not mirror any recent iteration of the property, a stance that accords with the practical-first approach he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film wrapped production and is tracking to its April 17, 2026 date. Anticipate a rollout that foregrounds aura and dread rather than fireworks, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership making room for budget rigor.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has spoken of Werwulf as the darkest project he has tackled, which tracks with a medieval world and era-correct language, a combination that can make for textured sound and a wintry, elemental feel on the big screen. Focus will likely tease this aesthetic in long-lead press and department features before rolling out a first look that trades on atmosphere over plot, a move that has performed for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is calibrated for rubbery nastiness, a signature of the series that performs globally in red-band trailers and drives shareable audience clips from early screenings. Scream 7 hints at a self-aware reset that re-centers the original lead. Resident Evil will stand or stumble on monster work and world-building, which play well in convention floor stunts and curated leaks. Insidious tends to be a soundstage showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the big-screen case feel definitive. Look for trailers that emphasize pinpoint sound design, deep-bass stingers, and hush beats that land in premium houses.

Annual flow

January is jammed. SOULM8TE opens January 9, 2026, then Sony returns a week later with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple on January 16. Cineverse’s Return to Silent Hill follows on January 23, a gloomy counterbalance amid marquee brands. The month caps with Send Help on January 30 via 20th Century Studios, a survival thriller from Sam Raimi that puts a star forward in Rachel McAdams. The competition here is thick, but the spread of tones creates a lane for each, and the five-week structure supports a clean run for each if word of mouth carries.

Late winter and spring stage summer. Scream 7 arrives February 27 with heritage buzz. In April, The Mummy reframes a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once played to genre counterprogramming and now can handle big openers. Universal’s untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 bridges into summer while maintaining horror’s hold on early May weekends that are not claimed by superheroes or family tentpoles.

Summer sharpens the contrast. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is comic-leaning and wide, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 unleashes hard-R intensity. The counterprogramming logic is coherent. The spoof can hit next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest delights older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have rolled through premiums.

Late summer into fall leans recognizable. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives the studio a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously excelled. Resident Evil lands after September 18, a transitional slot that still ties into Halloween marketing beats. The Peele event books October 23 and will soak up cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely driven by a minimalist tease strategy and limited information drops that lean on concept not plot.

Prestige-horror at year-end. Werwulf on December 25 is a position that genre can thrive over the holidays when packaged as director prestige horror. The distributor has done this before, measured platforming, then using critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to linger in conversation into January. If the film pleases critics, the studio can scale in the first week of 2027 while enjoying holiday hold and gift-card redemption.

Embedded title notes

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting on a rolling basis as production moves. Logline: Sidney returns to counter a new Ghostface while the narrative reorients around the original film’s genes. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: return-to-core with a fresh edge.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, More about the author 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A sorrowing man’s machine mate escalates into something deadly romantic. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming finished for an early-year bow. Positioning: tech thriller with grief spine.

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple (Sony, January 16, 2026)
Director: Nia DaCosta. Writer: Alex Garland. Top cast: Cillian Murphy, Jack O’Connell, and additional ensemble tied to a new antagonist faction. Logline: The second chapter in a trilogy expands the scope beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult forms in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Twin-shot with the first film. Positioning: next step of a prestige infection saga.

Return to Silent Hill (Cineverse, January 23, 2026)
Director: Christophe Gans. Top cast: TBA in updated campaign materials. Logline: A man returns to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to collide with a unstable reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Finished with U.S. theatrical locked. Positioning: tone-first game adaptation.

Send Help (20th Century Studios, January 30, 2026)
Director: Sam Raimi. Top cast: Rachel McAdams, Dylan O’Brien, Dennis Haysbert, Chris Pang. Logline: After a plane crash, an employee and her tough boss try to survive on a cut-off island as the hierarchy swivels and mistrust rises. Rating: TBA. Production: Shoot complete. Positioning: A-list survival chiller from a master.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles under wraps in official materials. Logline: A fresh reimagining that returns the monster to chill, shaped by Cronin’s practical effects and oozing dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Principal wrapped. Positioning: iconic monster return with auteur mark.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A in-home haunting narrative that threads the dread through a youth’s shifting POV. Rating: forthcoming. Production: picture-locked. Positioning: studio-backed, star-driven occult suspense.

Scary Movie 6 (Paramount, June 12, 2026)
Director: Michael Tiddes. Top cast: Anna Faris, Regina Hall, with the Wayans brothers rejoining on the creative side. Logline: {A spoof revival that needles today’s horror trends and true-crime buzz. Rating: pending. Production: shoot planned for fall 2025. Positioning: four-quadrant summer counterplay.

Evil Dead Burn (Warner Bros. domestic, July 24, 2026)
Director: Sébastien Vaniček. Top cast: Souheila Yacoub, with ensemble additions. Logline: A new infestation of Deadites bursts, with an globe-spanning twist in tone and setting. Rating: TBD. Production: principal photography in New Zealand. Positioning: hard-hitting R entry designed for premium formats.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: unrevealed for now. Top cast: forthcoming. Logline: The Further reopens, with a different family lashed to residual nightmares. Rating: not yet rated. Production: planning summer shoot for late-summer date. Positioning: durable spectral IP in a late-summer sweet spot.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: awaiting public disclosure. Top cast: unrevealed. Logline: A from-scratch rebuild designed to reconstruct the franchise from the ground up, with an center of gravity in survivalist horror over set-piece spectacle. Rating: TBA. Production: in development with a locked date. Positioning: lore-true modernization with broad upside.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: awaiting confirmation. Logline: purposely secretive. Rating: forthcoming. Production: continuing. Positioning: director-branded event with teaser focus.

Werwulf (Focus Features, December 25, 2026)
Director: Robert Eggers. Top cast: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, with other regulars expected. Logline: A medieval werewolf story built on period language and elemental dread. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: in preparation with Christmas frame locked. Positioning: high-craft holiday horror with awards-season tail.

Wolf Creek: Legacy (Cineverse, TBA 2026)
Director: Greg McLean. Top cast: John Jarratt expected to return as Mick Taylor. Logline: The Australian outback slasher returns, with a theaters-first plan ahead of platforming. Status: timing TBD, fall window eyed.

Why 2026, why now

Three pragmatic forces drive this lineup. First, production that slowed or rearranged in 2024 needed slack in the schedule. Horror can patch those gaps promptly because scripts often need fewer locations, fewer large-scale effects set pieces, and condensed timelines. Second, studios have become more structured about windows. Theatrical exclusivity remains the goal for most of these films, followed by PVOD and then platform streaming, a sequence that has consistently exceeded straight-to-streaming drops. Third, online chatter converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will lean on bite-size scare clips from test screenings, carefully timed scare clips dropping on Thursday previews, and experiential pop-ups that serve as influencer content. It is a repeatable playbook because it succeeds.

There is also the slotting calculus. Early corridors for family and capes are leaner in 2026, creating valuable space for genre entries that can dominate a weekend or function as the older-skew counter. January is the prime example. Four varied shades of horror will share space across five weekends, which reduces inter-title cannibalization. Summer provides the other window. The parody aligns with early family and action waves, then the hard-R entry can make hay in a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Business view: budgets, ratings, sleeper chase

Budgets remain in the sweet spot. Most of the films above will come in under $40–$50 million, with many far below. That allows for robust premium-format allocation without needing superhero-level volume to break even. The most likely R ratings include Evil Dead Burn, Werwulf, and possibly Resident Evil depending on the final cut. Scream 7, Insidious, and SOULM8TE can plausibly land PG-13 to maximize reach, though each franchise has toggled between ratings in the past. Specialty plays tend to lean R to preserve tone and intensity.

The sleeper chase continues in Q1, where lower and mid-budget genre can own weekends with minimal competition, and again in late summer, where horror often becomes the conversation when tentpoles tire. The 2026 slate is set up to maximize those pockets. January could easily deliver the first left-field winner of the year, and August into September gives Sony an avenue to hold screens with back-to-back supernatural IP while still leaving room for an indie breakout.

Internationally, brand recognition helps Resident Evil, Evil Dead, and Scream travel, while 28 Years Later benefits from a British setting and returning talent. Werwulf and The Mummy will lean on auteur and classic-monster awareness abroad. Streamers will amplify the tail, with copyright pickups boosting Universal’s slate and Shudder driving evangelism for Cineverse titles. Plan on a solid PVOD window generally, since horror fans have shown a willingness to pay for convenience after an opening weekend, especially when word of mouth is strong.

Audience rhythm across the year

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers beat and breadth. January is a buffet, February delivers a legacy slasher, April reawakens a Universal monster, May and June provide a one-two spectral pairing for date nights and group outings, July goes for the throat, August and September keep the supernatural momentum, October turns into a Jordan Peele event, and December invites a somber, literate nightmare. That is how you maintain buzz and butts in seats without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can escalate across the year, using earlier releases to condition the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors value the spacing. Horror delivers preview-night pops, tight deployments, and strong PLF uptake when the creative supports it. The 2026 slate has at least three titles that can warrant PLF, with The Mummy, Evil Dead Burn, and Werwulf all showcasing dimensionality, sound field, and framing that benefit from larger formats. The calendar also leaves room for specialty platformers to open in New York and Los Angeles, build reviews, and slide into national conversation as the fall progresses.

2026, Lined Up To Scare

Timing shifts. Ratings change. Casts rotate. But the spine of 2026 horror is firm. There is IP strength where it matters, original vision where it matters, and a calendar that shows studios meet the timing for scares. The awards and festival pipeline into 2027 will come into focus once the fall festivals lock, and it would not be surprising to see at least one closing-window arthouse pickup join the party. For now, the job is simple, craft precise trailers, preserve the surprise, and let the shocks sell the seats.