Ancient Dread surfaces: Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed, a nightmare fueled thriller, launching October 2025 on global platforms

A hair-raising spiritual suspense film from literary architect / director Andrew Chiaramonte, releasing an age-old fear when unfamiliar people become subjects in a devilish maze. Airings begin October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime, YouTube streaming, Google Play Movies & TV, Apple iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango’s digital service.

L.A., CA (August 8, 2025) – Prepare yourselves for *Young & Cursed*, a traumatizing tale of struggle and age-old darkness that will redefine terror storytelling this autumn. Realized by rising filmmaking talent Andrew Chiaramonte, this nerve-racking and shadowy screenplay follows five strangers who snap to sealed in a hidden shelter under the unfriendly rule of Kyra, a possessed female dominated by a antiquated sacrosanct terror. Prepare to be hooked by a screen-based journey that intertwines instinctive fear with folklore, premiering on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on October 2, 2025.


Diabolic occupation has been a well-established trope in cinema. In *Young & Cursed*, that tradition is radically shifted when the presences no longer appear beyond the self, but rather internally. This echoes the most terrifying version of all involved. The result is a riveting cognitive warzone where the story becomes a merciless tug-of-war between moral forces.


In a desolate no-man's-land, five campers find themselves trapped under the evil force and curse of a unknown entity. As the youths becomes unresisting to combat her command, abandoned and tormented by entities unnamable, they are required to endure their core terrors while the deathwatch coldly ticks toward their demise.


In *Young & Cursed*, tension mounts and relationships crack, demanding each character to examine their true nature and the principle of conscious will itself. The threat intensify with every tick, delivering a terror ride that fuses supernatural terror with human vulnerability.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my desire was to uncover raw dread, an darkness older than civilization itself, embedding itself in inner turmoil, and testing a power that questions who we are when robbed of choice.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Transforming into Kyra needed manifesting something rooted in terror. She is innocent until the demon emerges, and that transformation is terrifying because it is so deep.”

Where to Watch

*Young & Cursed* will be aired for audiences beginning on October 2nd, 2025, on Prime Video, YouTube, Google Play, Apple iTunes, Apple’s streaming platform, and Fandango at Home—offering viewers in all regions can face this terrifying film.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just unveiled a new trailer update for *Young & Cursed*, up to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a second look to its original promo, which has pulled in over a huge fan reaction.


In addition to its continental debut, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has made public that *Young & Cursed* will also be offered to international markets, giving access to the movie to lovers of terror across nations.


Mark your calendar for this haunted ride through nightmares. Brace yourself for *Young & Cursed* this spooky debut to explore these ghostly lessons about our species.


For behind-the-scenes access, behind-the-scenes content, and press updates from the creators, follow @YoungCursedOfficial across entertainment pages and visit the official movie site.





Current horror’s inflection point: the year 2025 U.S. lineup blends primeval-possession lore, indie terrors, in parallel with brand-name tremors

Ranging from pressure-cooker survival tales suffused with biblical myth and onward to canon extensions and incisive indie visions, 2025 stands to become the richest and calculated campaign year in the past ten years.

The 2025 horror calendar is not merely full, it is methodical. Major studios are anchoring the year via recognizable brands, in tandem OTT services saturate the fall with debut heat and ancestral chills. In the indie lane, indie storytellers is fueled by the kinetic energy of a peak 2024 circuit. As Halloween stays the prime week, the rest of the calendar is filling out with surgical precision. The September, October gauntlet has become standard, notably this year, teams are capturing January, spring, and mid-summer. The audience is primed, studios are calculated, which means 2025 could be the most carefully plotted year to date.

Major Studio Plans with Mini-Major Flex: Prestige terror resurfaces

The upper tier is moving decisively. If 2024 laid the groundwork for a horror reinvention, 2025 presses the advantage.

Universal’s distribution arm sets the tone with a marquee bet: a refashioned Wolf Man, avoiding the standard nineteenth century European backdrop, but a crisp modern milieu. Under director Leigh Whannell anchored by Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner, this approach fixes the lycanthropy within intimate rupture. The arc is bodily and domestic, about marriage, caregiving, and fragile humanity. set for mid January, it advances a tactic to control the winter valley through premium horror, not dumps.

Spring ushers in Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher adaptation reframed as lean dread. From director Eli Craig anchored by Katie Douglas and Kevin Durand, it feels like crimson splashed Midwest menace with winked critique. Under the costume, it needles small town fear, cross generational rifts, and crowd punishment. Initial heat flags it as potent.

As summer winds down, Warner’s schedule drops the final chapter within its surest horror brand: The Conjuring: Last Rites. The Warrens are back with Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson, the piece hints at a heartfelt wrap as it treats a notorious case. Even with a familiar chassis, Chaves is expected to tune it to a grieving, self reflective color. It lands in early September, carving air ahead of October’s stack.

After that, The Black Phone 2. Set early then moved to October, a confidence tell. Derrickson resumes command, and those signature textures resurface: old school creep, trauma in the foreground, along with eerie supernatural rules. This pass pushes higher, by expanding the “grabber” backstory and grief across bloodlines.

Closing the prime list is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a film that does not need traditional marketing to sell tickets. The sophomore entry expands the mythology, broadens the animatronic terror cast, speaking to teens and older millennials. It opens in December, cornering year end horror.

Digital Originals: Lean budgets, heavy bite

With theaters prioritizing brand safety, platforms are greenlighting boldly, and the needle moves.

A flagship risky title is Weapons, a cold file multi story chiller braiding three timelines tied to a mass vanishing. Directed by Zach Cregger pairing Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, the work combines fright with dramatic torque. With a late summer theatrical bow and fall streaming drop, it may catalyze deconstruction threads like Barbarian.

On the more intimate flank sits Together, a sealed box body horror arc led by Alison Brie and Dave Franco. Confined to a lonely rental when a vacation turns, the arc observes love and green eyed envy and self harm turned somatic. It feels intimate, ghastly, and profoundly uneasy, a three part fall into codependent hell. While no platform has formally placed a date, it is a lock for fall streaming.

One more platform talker is Sinners, a Depression era vampire folk fable anchored by Michael B. Jordan. Lensed in lush sepia and soaked in biblical metaphor, it nods to There Will Be Blood beside Let the Right One In. The project looks at American religious trauma under a supernatural allegory. Early test screens tag it as a top talked streaming debut.

Extra indies bide their time on platforms: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper all mine grief and vanishing and identity, running metaphor first.

Possession, Deeper Than Ever: Young & Cursed

Hitting October 2 on the platforms, Young & Cursed positions itself as a rare hybrid, intimate in scope and mythic in reach. Penned and steered by Andrew Chiaramonte, the work follows five strangers rousing in a remote timber cabin, under Kyra’s control, a young woman possessed by the ancient biblical demon Lilith. As dusk gives way to night, Kyra’s grip intensifies, a violating force plundering fears, vulnerabilities, and regrets.

The chill is psyche led, anchored in primal myth. Avoiding the usual exorcism path with Catholic ritual and Latin spell, this film taps something older, something darker. Lilith is not summoned by priests, she rises from trauma, muteness, and human fault lines. Making possession internal threads Young & Cursed into the current of intimate character studies in genre skin.

Across Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play, and Fandango at Home, the film stands as Halloween counterprogramming to sequel glut and monster revivals. It is canny scheduling. No overweight mythology. No series drag. Bare psychological dread, trim and tense, designed for binge and breath patterns. With a spectacle heavy year, Young & Cursed may pop by going quiet, then screaming.

Festival Launchpads, Market Engines

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF remain breeding grounds for what horror looks like six to twelve months later. And in 2025, they are acting more like launchpads than showcases.

Fantastic Fest fields a robust horror set this year. Primate bows as a tropical body horror opener with Cronenberg and Herzog echoes. Whistle, a revenge folktale steeped in Aztec myth, is tapped to close with fire.

Midnight offerings such as If I Had Legs I’d Kick You surge on execution beyond the hook. A24 support plus satire of toxic fandom in a convention lockdown puts it on breakout watch.

SXSW lifted Clown in a Cornfield and put microbudget hauntings into market talk. Sundance is expected to unspool its usual crop of grief soaked elevated horror, as Tribeca’s genre wing angles urban, social, and surreal.

Festivals in 2025 double as branding machines. That wreath is now a starting gun, not the finish.

Long Running Lines: Sequels, Reboots, and Reinvention

The franchise bench is sturdier and more targeted than lately.

Fear Street: Prom Queen, dated July, revives the 90s franchise with a new lead and throwback tone. Departing prior tones, it leans camp and prom night melodrama. Picture tiaras, bright red goo, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 opens late June, seeking to build out techno horror lore using new characters and AI born frights. The initial entry’s meme life and streaming legs push Universal to scale up.

The Long Walk adapts an early, scathing Stephen King work, from Francis Lawrence, it stands as a punishing dystopian allegory wearing survival horror, a march until death with no victors. With clear targeting, it could become The Hunger Games for horror grown ups.

Other reboots and sequels, including Hell House LLC: Lineage, V/H/S/Halloween, The Toxic Avenger, and Anaconda, scatter across the calendar, many awaiting strategic windows or late acquisitions.

Signals and Trends

Mythic lanes mainstream
From Lilith in Young & Cursed to Aztec curses in Whistle, creators turn to ancient texts and symbols. It is not nostalgia, it is re owning pre Christian archetypes. Horror reaches past fear, it states evil is old.

Body horror reemerges
Projects including Together, Weapons, and Keeper re center the flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation now read as metaphors for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

Streaming Originals Grow Teeth
The filler era wanes for platform horror. SVOD players fund strong scripts, proven directors, and real spend. Films like Weapons and Sinners are treated as events, not content.

Festival hype becomes leverage
Wreaths work as currency, buying release slots, placement, and press. In 2025, a horror film lacking festival plan may fade.

Theaters are a trust fall
The big screen goes to those expected to beat comps or build series. Everything else heads to PVOD or hybrid drops. Horror is not vanishing from theaters, it is getting curated.

Near Term Outlook: Fall saturation and a winter joker

With Young & Cursed, The Conjuring: Last Rites, The Black Phone 2, and Weapons all stacked across September and October, the fall is downright saturated. Indies such as Bone Lake and Keeper will tussle for space. Watch for one or more of these to pivot into early 2026 or shift platforms.

December anchors on Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, yet a surprise streamer drop could appear in the final weeks. With mythic energy high, a late creature or exorcism entry could pop.

Horror’s 2025 outcome will be decided not by one title, but by how its variety connects with splintered audiences. The play is not Get Out replication, it is long life horror past theaters.



The oncoming spook season: next chapters, non-franchise titles, and also A loaded Calendar Built For jolts

Dek: The emerging terror year loads from the jump with a January traffic jam, following that stretches through the summer months, and well into the late-year period, braiding brand equity, novel approaches, and tactical counterprogramming. Distributors with platforms are doubling down on tight budgets, box-office-first windows, and viral-minded pushes that pivot these releases into mainstream chatter.

Horror’s position as 2026 begins

The field has established itself as the most reliable tool in studio slates, a pillar that can spike when it breaks through and still insulate the liability when it misses. After the 2023 year demonstrated to studio brass that disciplined-budget fright engines can galvanize audience talk, the following year continued the surge with director-led heat and unexpected risers. The trend carried into 2025, where reawakened brands and elevated films showed there is a market for a spectrum, from legacy continuations to standalone ideas that carry overseas. The end result for the 2026 slate is a roster that appears tightly organized across players, with mapped-out bands, a harmony of legacy names and novel angles, and a refocused emphasis on exclusive windows that boost PVOD and platform value on premium rental and platforms.

Executives say the category now operates like a utility player on the release plan. Horror can kick off on virtually any date, yield a grabby hook for previews and vertical videos, and punch above weight with ticket buyers that turn out on first-look nights and return through the subsequent weekend if the film hits. On the heels of a strike-bent pipeline, the 2026 setup signals faith in that equation. The slate rolls out with a thick January block, then turns to spring and early summer for off-slot scheduling, while keeping space for a fall corridor that runs into late October and into post-Halloween. The grid also includes the deeper integration of indie arms and SVOD players that can launch in limited release, grow buzz, and grow at the proper time.

A reinforcing pattern is brand curation across connected story worlds and legacy IP. Big banners are not just greenlighting another return. They are looking to package continuity with a occasion, whether that is a logo package that conveys a recalibrated tone or a cast configuration that anchors a latest entry to a original cycle. At the concurrently, the filmmakers behind the headline-grabbing originals are celebrating practical craft, practical gags and place-driven backdrops. That mix produces 2026 a lively combination of home base and newness, which is how horror tends to travel globally.

How the majors and mini-majors are programming

Paramount leads early with two marquee plays 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, presenting it as both a handoff and a rootsy character-first story. Production is underway in Atlanta, and the tonal posture hints at a memory-charged campaign without replaying the last two entries’ Carpenter-sisters arc. Watch for a push built on iconic art, character previews, and a tease cadence landing toward late fall. Distribution is theatrical through Paramount.

Paramount also reawakens a once-mighty spoof franchise with Scary Movie 6 on June 12, 2026, directed by Michael Tiddes. Anna Faris and Regina Hall are reuniting, with the Wayans brothers involved on the creative side for the first time since the early 2000s, a selling point the campaign will spotlight. As a summer counter-slot, this one will seek four-quadrant chatter through social-friendly gags, with the horror spoof format permitting quick switches to whatever rules the discourse that spring.

Universal has three clear projects. SOULM8TE premieres January 9, 2026, a tech-horror spinoff from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The core idea is straightforward, grief-rooted, and easily pitched: a grieving man purchases an algorithmic mate that grows into a killer companion. The date locates it at the front of a crowded corridor, with Universal’s team likely to renew eerie street stunts and quick hits that blurs love and anxiety.

On May 8, 2026, the studio schedules an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely assumed to be the feature developed under development titles in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The dated slate currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which creates space for a name unveil to become an attention spike closer to the early tease. The timing gives Universal a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles stack elsewhere.

Anchoring the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film books October 23, 2026, a slot he has worked well before. Peele’s pictures are set up as must-see filmmaker statements, with a mystery-first teaser and a subsequent trailers that signal tone without plot the concept. The Halloween-adjacent date lets the studio to maximize pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then lean on the copyright window to capture late-October interest at home.

Warner Bros., via New Line, pairs with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček guides, with Souheila Yacoub starring. The franchise has shown that a visceral, practical-effects forward mix can feel high-value on a tight budget. Position this as a splatter summer horror surge that maximizes global traction, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most international markets.

Sony’s horror bench is notably deep. The studio sets two recognizable-IP pushes in the back half. An untitled Insidious film arrives August 21, 2026, keeping a steady supernatural brand front and center while the spin-off branch advances. Sony has reslotted on this title before, but the current plan plants it in late summer, where Insidious has often excelled.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil returns in what the studio is selling as a new foundation for its game-to-film powerhouse. With the PlayStation Productions pipeline now a pillar part of the studio’s strategy, this new take has a well-defined brief to serve both loyalists and first-timers. The fall slot affords Sony time to build materials around world-building, and practical creature work, elements that can stoke deluxe auditorium demand and fan-culture participation.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, books a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film continues Eggers’ run of period horror grounded in careful craft and language, this time steeped in lycan lore. Focus has already set the date for a holiday release, a clear message in Eggers as a specialty play that can scale widely if early reception is warm.

Streamers and platform exclusives

Digital strategies for 2026 run on predictable routes. Universal’s slate transition to copyright after a big-screen and PVOD window, a structure that expands both initial urgency and subscriber lifts in the back half. Prime Video stitches together third-party pickups with international acquisitions and targeted theatrical runs when the data recommends it. Max and Hulu lean on their strengths in catalog discovery, using well-timed internal promotions, fright rows, and handpicked rows to sustain interest on the 2026 genre total. Netflix stays nimble about originals and festival pickups, finalizing horror entries toward the drop and turning into events drops with surge campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, operates a staged of precision theatrical plays and fast windowing that monetizes buzz via trials. That will play for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before turning to direct-to-fan channels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ cherry-picks horror on a discrete basis. The platform has proven amenable to buy select projects with accomplished filmmakers or name-led packages, then give them a prestige theatrical in partnership with exhibitors to meet awards eligibility or to gather buzz before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney’s domestic pipeline still leverages the 20th Century Studios slate, a major factor for retention when the genre conversation spikes.

Specialized lanes

Cineverse is mapping a 2026 arc with two IP plays. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The pitch is simple: the same brooding, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a genre cult touchstone, elevated for modern sonics and picture. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a fall window, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. Cineverse has signaled a traditional theatrical plan for the title, an healthy marker for fans of the gritty series and for exhibitors hungry for R material in the September weeks.

Focus will operate the filmmaker lane with Werwulf, stewarding the film through autumn festivals if the cut is ready, then pressing the holiday slot to expand. That positioning has delivered for filmmaker-driven genre with broader reach. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not publicly set many dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines generally solidify after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A sound expectation is a sprinkle of late-summer and fall platformers that can expand if reception warrants. Watch for an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that premieres at Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work as a pair, using small theatrical to fuel evangelism that fuels their membership.

Legacy titles versus originals

By count, 2026 leans toward the legacy column. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all leverage cultural cachet. The caveat, as ever, is staleness. The go-to fix is to pitch each entry as a new angle. Paramount is centering character and legacy in Scream 7, Sony is positioning a clean restart for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is pushing a French-accented approach from a emerging director. Those choices make a difference when the audience has so many options and social sentiment tilts quickly.

Originals and director-first projects keep oxygen in the system. Jordan Peele’s October film will be pitched as a brand unto itself. Sam Raimi’s Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, casts Rachel McAdams in a survival shocker premise with the filmmaker’s mischievous menace. SOULM8TE offers a clean, creepy tech hook. Werwulf roots in era detail and an rigorous tone. Even when the title is not based on legacy IP, the bundle is recognizable enough to turn curiosity into pre-sales and Thursday-night crowds.

Comps from the last three years frame the strategy. In 2023, a exclusive theatrical model that preserved streaming windows did not obstruct a hybrid test from hitting when the brand was compelling. In 2024, craft-forward auteur horror outperformed in premium formats. In 2025, a return of a beloved infection saga broadcast that global horror franchises can still feel new when they reframe POV 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 back-to-back plan, with chapters lensed sequentially, creates space for marketing to interlace chapters through character and theme and to keep materials circulating without extended gaps.

Production craft signals

The production chatter behind these films forecast a continued turn toward in-camera, locale-specific craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not imitate any recent iteration of the property, a stance that accords with the prosthetic-forward taste he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film closed principal and is on track for its April 17, 2026 date. Expect a campaign that highlights mood and dread rather than fireworks, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership bolstering financial discipline.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has spoken of Werwulf as the grimmest project he has tackled, which tracks with a historical setting and authentic period speech, a combination that can make for 3D sound and a chilly, elemental vibe on the big screen. Focus will likely tease this aesthetic in feature stories and artisan spotlights before rolling out a preview that keeps plot minimal, a move that has paid off for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is tuned for tactile gnarliness, a signature of the series that lands overseas in red-band trailers and earns shareable jump-cut reactions from early screenings. Scream 7 offers a meta pivot that centers an original star. Resident Evil will live or die on creature design and production design, which align with convention activations and guarded reveals. Insidious tends to be a soundstage showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the theater case feel must-have. Look for trailers that accent fine-grain sound, deep-bass stingers, and mute beats that benefit on big speakers.

Calendar cadence

January is loaded. Universal’s SOULM8TE opens January 9, 2026, then Sony returns a week later with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple on January 16. Return to Silent Hill follows on January 23, a atmospheric change-up amid bigger brand plays. The month finishes with Send Help on January 30 via 20th Century Studios, a crash-survival thriller from Sam Raimi that puts a star forward in Rachel McAdams. The competition here is legit, but the spread of tones opens lanes for all, and the five-week structure offers clean runway for each if word of mouth spreads.

Winter into spring set up the summer. Paramount’s Scream 7 comes February 27 with brand warmth. In April, The Mummy reawakens a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once was known for genre counterprogramming and now hosts big openers. The untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 connects into summer while maintaining horror’s hold on early May weekends that are not claimed by superheroes or family tentpoles.

Summer divides the tones. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is light and four-quadrant, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 presents brutal intensity. The counterprogramming logic is tight. The spoof can win next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest rewards older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have rolled through premiums.

August and September into October leans IP. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives Sony a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously performed. Resident Evil lands after September 18, a shoulder season window that still preps for Halloween marketing beats. Jordan Peele’s untitled film takes October 23 and will command cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely backed by a shroud-first teaser rhythm and limited asset reveals that favor idea over plot.

Prestige at year’s end. Werwulf on December 25 is a signal that genre can play the holidays when packaged as awards-flirting horror. Focus has done this before, measured platforming, then using critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to hold in chatter into January. If the film wins with critics, the studio can open up in the first week of 2027 while building on holiday impulse and gift-card use.

One-sentence dossiers

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting rolling out as production continues. Logline: Sidney returns to confront a new Ghostface while the narrative reorients around the original film’s DNA. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: roots reset with a contemporary edge.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A grieving man’s machine mate mutates into something lethally affectionate. Rating: TBA. Production: Completed principal photography for an early-year bow. Positioning: silicon scare with soul.

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 widens the scope beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult forms in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Filmed in tandem with the first film. Positioning: prestige zombie continuation.

Return to Silent Hill (Cineverse, January 23, 2026)
Director: Christophe Gans. Top cast: TBA in updated campaign materials. Logline: A man finds his way back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to stumble upon a altering reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Completed production with U.S. distribution. Positioning: gothic-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 hard-edged boss battle to survive on a uninhabited island as the power dynamic shifts and paranoia creeps in. Rating: TBA. Production: Shoot complete. Positioning: star-led survival horror from a master director.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles confidential in official materials. Logline: A renewed vision that returns the monster to dread, grounded in Cronin’s material craft and oozing dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Wrapped. Positioning: legacy monster restart with director stamp.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A household haunting premise that leverages the chill of a child’s wobbly POV. Rating: pending. Production: wrapped. Positioning: studio-backed, star-driven ghostly suspense.

Scary Movie 6 (Paramount, June 12, 2026)
Director: Michael Tiddes. Top cast: Anna Faris, Regina Hall, with the Wayans brothers back in creative roles. Logline: {A comic send-up that needles contemporary horror memes and true-crime crazes. Rating: rating forthcoming. Production: cameras due to roll fall 2025. Positioning: mainstream summer comedy-horror.

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 erupts, with an cross-border twist in tone and setting. Rating: to be announced. Production: shooting in New Zealand. Positioning: R-rated franchise charge tuned for PLF.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: TBA publicly. Top cast: unrevealed. Logline: The Further yawns again, with a another family entangled with residual nightmares. Rating: not yet rated. Production: gearing up for summer filming with late-summer bow. Positioning: reliable supernatural IP in a date that favors the brand.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: TBD publicly. Top cast: to be announced. Logline: A from-scratch rebuild designed to reconstruct the franchise from the ground up, with an emphasis on survival horror over action-forward bombast. Rating: forthcoming. Production: dev phase with date secured. Positioning: source-faithful reboot with four-quadrant path.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: to be announced. Logline: closely held. Rating: not yet rated. Production: ongoing. Positioning: teaser-forward filmmaker happening.

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-specific language and bone-deep menace. Rating: forthcoming. Production: gearing up with December 25 frame. Positioning: holiday prestige play with craft awards upside.

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: window fluid, autumn forecast.

Why 2026 makes sense

Three grounded forces inform this lineup. First, production that stalled or recalendared in 2024 demanded space on the calendar. Horror can slot in fast because scripts often need fewer locations, fewer large-scale VFX sequences, and accelerated schedules. Second, studios have become more orderly about windows. Theatrical exclusivity remains the goal for most of these films, followed by PVOD and then platform streaming, a sequence that has consistently beaten straight-to-streaming placements. Third, community talk converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will lean on turnkey scare beats from test screenings, precision scare clips aligned to Thursday preview shows, and experiential pop-ups that generate creator assets. It is a repeatable playbook because it performs.

There is also the slotting calculus. Early-2026 family and superhero concentrations ease, freeing space for genre entries that can seize a weekend or sit as the slightly older-skewing alternative. January is the prime example. Four horror varieties will compete across five weekends, which gives each title a lane and limits cannibalization. Summer provides the other window. The send-up tracks alongside early family and action traffic, then the hard-R entry can use a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Money matters, ratings, and surprise hits

Budgets remain in the ideal band. Most of the films above will fit below the $40–$50 million line, with many far below. That allows for aggressive PLF bookings 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-hit hunt 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 leverage those opportunities. January could easily deliver the first surprise over-performer 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. Forecast a healthy PVOD window broadly, since horror fans have shown a willingness to pay for convenience after an opening weekend, especially when word of mouth is strong.

How the year flows for audiences

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers pace and range. January is a smorgasbord, February delivers a legacy slasher, April revives a Universal monster, May and June provide a paranormal one-two for date nights and group outings, July turns feral, August and September keep the supernatural momentum, October turns into a Jordan Peele event, and December invites a icy, literate nightmare. That is how you sustain heat and footfall 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 welcome the spacing. Horror delivers steady Thursday pops, smart allocations, and strong PLF uptake when the creative supports it. The 2026 slate has at least three titles that can win premium screens, with The Mummy, Evil Dead Burn, and Werwulf all showcasing detail, audio design, and imagery that benefit from larger formats. The calendar also leaves room for specialty platformers to open his comment is here in New York and Los Angeles, build reviews, and slide into national conversation as the fall progresses.

2026 Looks Exciting

Timing shifts. Ratings change. Casts rotate. But the spine of 2026 horror is defined. There is brand heft where it matters, filmmaker vision where it matters, and a calendar that shows studios sense the cadence of 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 late-arriving specialty entry join the party. For now, the job is simple, cut crisp trailers, lock the reveals, and let the shocks sell the seats.