Age-old Terror Awakens in Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed, a nerve shredding horror thriller, rolling out October 2025 across global platforms

A frightening unearthly thriller from screenwriter / helmer Andrew Chiaramonte, unbinding an timeless malevolence when passersby become puppets in a fiendish ordeal. Launching this October 2nd, 2025, on Amazon’s Prime Video, Google’s YouTube, Google Play, Apple’s iTunes, Apple’s TV+ service, and Fandango on-demand.

Los Angeles, CA (August 8, 2025) – Prepare yourselves for *Young & Cursed*, a harrowing portrayal of struggle and timeless dread that will reimagine fear-driven cinema this harvest season. Crafted by rising filmmaking talent Andrew Chiaramonte, this harrowing and moody motion picture follows five figures who snap to ensnared in a far-off hideaway under the ominous will of Kyra, a possessed female possessed by a antiquated sacrosanct terror. Arm yourself to be captivated by a immersive venture that integrates gut-punch terror with ancestral stories, coming on Amazon’s streaming platform, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on the second of October, 2025.


Spiritual takeover has been a mainstay narrative in film. In *Young & Cursed*, that norm is reimagined when the entities no longer arise from elsewhere, but rather from deep inside. This symbolizes the most hidden element of the cast. The result is a bone-chilling cognitive warzone where the tension becomes a perpetual confrontation between good and evil.


In a isolated outland, five youths find themselves isolated under the dark aura and control of a obscure character. As the victims becomes defenseless to combat her influence, marooned and followed by spirits unnamable, they are driven to reckon with their greatest panics while the doomsday meter coldly counts down toward their death.


In *Young & Cursed*, fear swells and friendships splinter, forcing each cast member to doubt their true nature and the foundation of personal agency itself. The danger mount with every tick, delivering a nerve-wracking journey that intertwines ghostly evil with inner turmoil.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my objective was to explore raw dread, an threat older than civilization itself, embedding itself in fragile psyche, and questioning a being that dismantles free will when freedom is gone.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Portraying Kyra meant evoking something deeper than fear. She is uninformed until the demon emerges, and that conversion is shocking because it is so raw.”

Platform Access

*Young & Cursed* will be accessible for audience access beginning from October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime, Google’s video hub, Google Play, Apple iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home—guaranteeing audiences around the globe can watch this haunted release.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just unveiled a new extended look for *Young & Cursed*, up to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a sequel to its first preview, which has received over a viral response.


In addition to its initial rollout, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has informed that *Young & Cursed* will also be distributed abroad, taking the terror to fans of fear everywhere.


Be sure to catch this mind-warping descent into hell. Join *Young & Cursed* this horror drop to experience these spiritual awakenings about the human condition.


For featurettes, special features, and alerts from the cast and crew, follow @YACMovie across online outlets and visit the official movie site.





Horror’s sea change: 2025 for genre fans U.S. lineup interlaces archetypal-possession themes, art-house nightmares, and series shake-ups

Beginning with last-stand terror inspired by mythic scripture through to canon extensions together with sharp indie viewpoints, 2025 appears poised to be the most variegated in tandem with tactically planned year in the past ten years.

The 2025 horror calendar is not merely full, it is methodical. the big studios stabilize the year via recognizable brands, as streaming platforms prime the fall with new perspectives together with ancient terrors. Meanwhile, the artisan tier is surfing the kinetic energy from an unprecedented 2024 fest surge. As Halloween stays the prime week, the off-peak lanes are managed with purpose. A dense September through October runway is now a rite of passage, though in this cycle, rollouts stretch into January, spring, and mid-summer. Viewers are hungry, studios are surgical, and 2025 is positioned to be the most designed season yet.

Studio Roadmap and Mini-Major Pulse: Prestige-leaning dread rebounds

The top end is active. If 2024 prepared the terrain, 2025 presses the advantage.

Universal’s schedule begins the calendar with a headline swing: a modernized Wolf Man, avoiding the standard nineteenth century European backdrop, but a sharp contemporary setting. Guided by 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. timed for mid January, it is part of the new strategy to own the box office’s winter dead zone with prestige horror instead of dumping ground thrillers.

By spring, Clown in a Cornfield premieres, a YA slasher adaptation reframed as lean dread. Under Eli Craig with Katie Douglas alongside Kevin Durand, it plays as blood lacquered Americana with satire under the paint. Under the guise, it interrogates township panic, generational breaks, and mob rule. Early festival buzz suggests it has teeth.

When summer tapers, Warner’s schedule unveils the final movement from its bankable horror series: The Conjuring: Last Rites. Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson again portray Ed and Lorraine Warren, the installment aims for closure as it frames a famed case. Granted the structure is classic, Michael Chaves is rumored to steer toward a somber, reflective register for the close. It is dated for early September, granting margin before October’s crush.

Then comes The Black Phone 2. Planned for early summer, the October reposition reads assertive. Derrickson re boards, and the hallmarks that turned the first into a sleeper reappear: 70s style chill, trauma as text, plus uncanny supernatural grammar. This pass pushes higher, through a thicker read on the “grabber” legend and generational ache.

Bringing up the winter anchor is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a release that travels on brand alone. The sequel leans deeper into its lore, grows the animatronic horror lineup, speaking to teens and older millennials. It opens in December, anchoring horror’s winter tail.

Streamer Exclusives: Tight funds, wide impact

While theaters bet on familiarity, platforms are wagering boldly, and results are there.

A leading ambitious platform entry is Weapons, a forensic chill anthology lacing three time frames tied to a mass vanishing. With Zach Cregger directing with turns by Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, the title blends fear with dramatic gravity. Hitting theaters late summer with fall digital, it seems set to fuel decode culture and breakdowns, in the Barbarian lane.

On the minimalist axis arrives Together, an intimate body horror unraveling including Alison Brie and Dave Franco. Situated in an out of the way rental during a failed escape, the piece probes how love, envy, and self loathing become bodily rot. It feels intimate, ghastly, and profoundly uneasy, a three part fall into codependent hell. Although a platform date is not yet posted, it is destined for a fall landing.

Also rising is Sinners, a 1930s vintage vampire folk yarn starring Michael B. Jordan. Photographed in sepia saturation with biblical metaphor, it plays like There Will Be Blood meets Let the Right One In. The narrative analyzes American religious trauma through a ghostly allegory. Pre release tests anoint it a conversation starter on streaming.

Several other streaming indies are quietly waiting in the wings: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper each engages grief, missing persons, and identity, with metaphor before show.

Possession From Within: Young & Cursed

Hitting October 2 on the platforms, Young & Cursed emerges as a rare mix, tight in frame and epic in resonance. Written and helmed by Andrew Chiaramonte, the narrative rides with five strangers waking in a secluded woodland cabin, held by 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 chill is psyche led, anchored in primal myth. Resisting the exorcism template of Catholic ceremony and Latin chant, this one bores into something older, something darker. Lilith does not answer ceremony, she climbs through trauma, hush, and human fracture. By making possession inward rather than external, Young & Cursed joins a trend toward intimate character studies masked as 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 clever angle. No heavy handed lore. No legacy baggage. Just psychological dread, contained and tense, tailored to the binge then breathe cadence of digital horror fans. Among spectacle, Young & Cursed might win by restraint, then release.

Festival Born and Buyer Ready

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF function as launch beds for the coming year’s horror. They feel like launchpads now, not just showcases.

Fantastic Fest fields a robust horror set this year. Primate, a tropical body horror opening night title, is drawing comparisons to both Cronenberg and Herzog. Whistle, Aztec coded revenge folklore, may cap the fest blazing.

Those midnight titles, including If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, buzz from delivery as much as naming. That title, with A24 backing, satirizes toxic fandom during a convention lockdown and is set to pop.

SXSW lifted Clown in a Cornfield and put microbudget hauntings into market talk. Sundance is on track for grief tuned elevated horror, while Tribeca’s genre yard leans urban, social, and surreal.

Festival playbooks now prize branding as much as discovery. Badges kick off the sell, they do not merely decorate.

Legacy Brands: Sequels and Reboots, Reinvention Included

Legacy entries present stronger and more purposeful this time.

Fear Street: Prom Queen, due in July, revives the ’90s horror franchise with a new lead and a throwback tone. Departing prior tones, it leans camp and prom night melodrama. Imagine tiaras, smeared red, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 opens late June, with a plan to deepen its techno horror mythos via new characters and AI terrors. That first run’s social and SVOD traction lets Universal push further.

On the slate sits The Long Walk, from one of Stephen King’s stark early titles, under Francis Lawrence, it shows as a grim dystopian parable set in survival horror, a youth walk ending only in death. If framed properly, it could echo The Hunger Games for adult horror.

Also present, reboots and sequels including Hell House LLC: Lineage, V/H/S/Halloween, The Toxic Avenger, and Anaconda, spread through the year, most watching for smart slots or quick buys.

What to Watch

Mythic horror goes mainstream
Young & Cursed with Lilith and Whistle with Aztec curses both signal ancient texts and symbols. It is not nostalgia, it is re owning pre Christian archetypes. Horror surpasses shocks, it recalls evil’s antiquity.

Body Horror Makes a Comeback
Work like Together, Weapons, and Keeper revisit the flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation are standing in for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

SVOD originals harden up
The days of disposable horror filler on digital platforms are over. Streamers back real writing, real filmmakers, and genuine marketing. Releases like Weapons and Sinners are elevated to events, not just content.

Badges become bargaining chips
Laurels move markets, opening release doors and coverage arcs. In 2025, a horror film lacking festival plan may fade.

Theatrical Is Now a Trust Fall
Studios hold theatrical for overperformers or future series seeds. Everything else is PVOD or hybrid. Horror stays in theaters, in chosen pockets.

Season Ahead: Autumn Overload and the Winter Wildcard

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 like Bone Lake and Keeper must claw for air. Keep an eye on possible slips into early 2026 or platform flips.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 steadies December, yet a last minute streamer surprise is in play. With some of the year’s biggest films leaning dark and mythic, the space for one final creature feature or exorcism flick is wide open.

The genre’s success in 2025 will hinge not on any one title, but on how well its diverse slate reaches its scattered, increasingly segmented audience. The goal is not Get Out again, it is horror with staying power past opening weekends.



The approaching fright year to come: returning titles, standalone ideas, And A hectic Calendar calibrated for screams

Dek: The arriving scare year stacks from day one with a January traffic jam, then carries through the summer months, and pushing into the year-end corridor, combining name recognition, creative pitches, and smart counterplay. Major distributors and platforms are betting on right-sized spends, exclusive theatrical windows first, and influencer-ready assets that turn genre releases into national conversation.

Where horror stands going into 2026

This space has emerged as the dependable tool in distribution calendars, a segment that can break out when it connects and still protect the drag when it fails to connect. After 2023 showed executives that disciplined-budget chillers can command the discourse, the following year continued the surge with director-led heat and surprise hits. The trend moved into the 2025 frame, where returns and festival-grade titles underscored there is a market for several lanes, from franchise continuations to original features that travel well. The sum for the 2026 slate is a programming that seems notably aligned across the market, with defined corridors, a harmony of household franchises and new packages, and a recommitted attention on theater exclusivity that amplify PVOD and streaming on premium on-demand and SVOD.

Marketers add the space now functions as a flex slot on the release plan. The genre can premiere on almost any weekend, yield a tight logline for spots and social clips, and punch above weight with viewers that line up on previews Thursday and continue through the next pass if the title hits. Exiting a strike-bent pipeline, the 2026 rhythm telegraphs certainty in that engine. The slate kicks off with a loaded January window, then leans on spring and early summer for audience offsets, while holding room for a late-year stretch that carries into the fright window and afterwards. The map also spotlights the continuing integration of arthouse labels and subscription services that can grow from platform, grow buzz, and broaden at the strategic time.

A companion trend is series management across shared IP webs and legacy franchises. Studio teams are not just mounting another next film. They are moving to present brand continuity with a specialness, whether that is a title design that signals a re-angled tone or a star attachment that bridges a fresh chapter to a vintage era. At the concurrently, the auteurs behind the eagerly awaited originals are championing material texture, physical gags and location-forward worlds. That blend produces 2026 a healthy mix of brand comfort and shock, which is the formula for international play.

Major-player strategies for 2026

Paramount fires first with two prominent entries that live at opposite ends of the tone spectrum. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with Kevin Williamson in the top job and Neve Campbell back at the heart, angling it as both a legacy handover and a DNA-forward character study. Cameras are rolling in Atlanta, and the directional approach conveys a memory-charged framework without looping the last two entries’ sisters thread. Count on a promo wave rooted in recognizable motifs, first images of characters, and a tiered teaser plan aimed at late fall. Distribution is theatrical 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 re-teaming, with the Wayans brothers involved on the creative side for the first time since the early 2000s, a linchpin the campaign will play up. As a non-tentpole summer option, this one will hunt mass reach through share-ready beats, with the horror spoof format enabling quick turns to whatever leads the discourse that spring.

Universal has three distinct lanes. SOULM8TE arrives January 9, 2026, a digital-age offshoot from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The story engine is efficient, sorrow-tinged, and high-concept: a grieving man purchases an artificial companion that grows into a deadly partner. The date lines it up at the front of a competition-heavy month, with the Universal machine likely to bring back off-kilter promo beats and micro spots that blurs affection and fear.

On May 8, 2026, the studio positions an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely assumed to be the feature developed under early labels in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The dated slate currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which sets up a name unveil to become an fan moment closer to the initial promo. The timing creates a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles occupy other frames.

Closing out the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film plants on October 23, 2026, a slot he has thrived in before. His entries are presented as filmmaker events, with a teaser that reveals little and a second trailer wave that signal tone without plot the concept. The late-month date opens a lane to saturate pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then pivot to the copyright window to capture late-October interest at home.

Warner Bros., via New Line, partners with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček leads, with Souheila Yacoub headlining. The franchise has repeatedly shown that a flesh-and-blood, in-camera leaning strategy can feel big on a efficient spend. Position this as a viscera-heavy summer horror jolt that spotlights offshore potential, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most world markets.

Sony’s horror bench is loaded. The studio books two brand-forward plays in the back half. An untitled Insidious film arrives August 21, 2026, continuing a proven supernatural brand on the grid while the spin-off branch moves forward. Sony has shifted dates on this title before, but the current plan keeps it in late summer, where Insidious has shown strength.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil comes back in what Sony is describing as a ground-zero 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 explicit mandate to serve both fans and new audiences. The fall slot affords Sony time to build promo materials around setting detail, and creature design, elements that can stoke PLF interest and fan events.

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 maintains the filmmaker’s run of period horror characterized by textural authenticity and textual fidelity, this time orbiting lycan myth. Focus Features has already booked the frame for a holiday release, a clear message in the auteur as a specialty play that can move wide if early reception is supportive.

Streamers and platform exclusives

Platform strategies for 2026 run on proven patterns. Universal’s genre slate window into copyright after a big-screen and PVOD window, a ladder that amplifies both debut momentum and viewer acquisition in the after-window. Prime Video stitches together catalogue additions with global pickups and short theatrical plays when the data recommends it. Max and Hulu work their edges in back-catalog play, using seasonal hubs, spooky hubs, and curated rows to stretch the tail on lifetime take. Netflix remains opportunistic about own-slate titles and festival snaps, locking in horror entries toward the drop and staging as events drops with tight-window plans. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, harnesses a staged of targeted cinema placements and fast windowing that funnels enthusiasm into trials. That will be key for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before pivoting to fan pipelines in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ continues to weigh horror on a selective basis. The platform has been willing to secure select projects with accomplished filmmakers or star packages, then give them a boutique theatrical in partnership with exhibitors to meet award rules or to show bona fides before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney’s domestic pipeline still benefits from the 20th Century Studios slate, a critical input for monthly activity when the genre conversation surges.

Boutique label prospects

Cineverse is mapping a 2026 runway with two IP plays. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The appeal is uncomplicated: the same atmospheric, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original this content a diehard favorite, modernized for modern audio-visual craft. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a fall window, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. Cineverse has telegraphed a cinema-first plan for the title, an promising marker for fans of the relentless series and for exhibitors needing R-rated alternatives in the autumn stretch.

Focus will play the auteur card with Werwulf, marshalling the project through a fall festival swing if the cut is ready, then leveraging the holiday dates to go wider. That positioning has served the company well for arthouse horror with broader reach. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not firmed many 2026 dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines often crystallize after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A credible outlook is a sprinkle of late-summer and fall platformers that can break out if reception drives. Expect 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 in concert, using precision theatrical to kindle evangelism that fuels their community.

Balance of brands and originals

By volume, the 2026 slate favors the franchise column. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all exploit household recognition. The challenge, as ever, is viewer burnout. The preferred tactic is to sell each entry as a reframed mode. Paramount is foregrounding character and roots in Scream 7, Sony is indicating a new foundation for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is centering a French sensibility from a fresh helmer. Those choices register when the audience has so many options and social sentiment turns quickly.

Originals and filmmaker-first projects keep oxygen in the system. Jordan Peele’s October film will be presented 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 director’s playful dread. SOULM8TE offers a simple, unsettling tech hook. Werwulf roots in era detail and an rigorous tone. Even when the title is not based on a known brand, the assembly is familiar enough to build pre-sales and preview-night crowds.

Comparable trends from recent years make sense of the plan. In 2023, a cinema-first model that held distribution windows did not stop a day-date move from succeeding when the brand was robust. In 2024, auteur craft horror surged in PLF. In 2025, a resuscitation of a beloved infection saga broadcast that global horror franchises can still feel fresh when they rotate 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 paired-chapter approach, with chapters shot in tandem, creates space for marketing to relate entries through character arcs and themes and to keep materials circulating without extended gaps.

Technique and craft currents

The behind-the-scenes chatter behind the upcoming entries forecast a continued shift toward in-camera, locale-specific craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not echo any recent iteration of the property, a stance that matches the prosthetic-forward taste he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film finished filming and is moving toward its April 17, 2026 date. Marketing will likely that centers atmosphere and fear rather than roller-coaster spectacle, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership allowing financial discipline.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has talked about Werwulf as the grimmest project he has tackled, which tracks with a Middle Ages setting and authentic period speech, a combination that can make for 3D sound and a cold, elemental mood on the big screen. Focus will likely warm the market to this aesthetic in craft profiles and craft coverage before rolling out a first look that trades on atmosphere over plot, a move that has played for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is designed for gristle and gore, a signature of the series that sells overseas in red-band trailers and sparks shareable audience clips from early screenings. Scream 7 sets up a meta recalibration that centers its original star. Resident Evil will succeed or falter on creature craft and set design, which lend themselves to fan-con activations and planned releases. Insidious tends to be a sound design showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the theater case feel compelling. Look for trailers that foreground surgical sound design, deep-bass stingers, and sudden silences that work in PLF.

Calendar cadence

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 moody palate cleanser amid heavier IP. The month winds down with Send Help on January 30 via 20th Century Studios, a stranded thriller from Sam Raimi that puts a star forward in Rachel McAdams. The competition here is stiff, but the variety of tones lets each find a lane, and the five-week structure allows a clean run for each if word of mouth sustains.

Early-year through spring tee up summer. Paramount’s Scream 7 opens February 27 with legacy momentum. In April, The Mummy revives a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once suited genre counterprogramming and now backs big openers. The untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 steps into summer while maintaining horror’s hold on early May weekends that are not claimed by superheroes or family tentpoles.

Summer sorts the tones. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is spoofy and broad, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 brings red-band intensity. The counterprogramming logic is tight. The spoof can pop next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest serves older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have rotated off PLF.

Late summer into fall leans IP. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives Sony a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously connected. Resident Evil steps in after September 18, a early fall window that still preps for Halloween marketing beats. Jordan Peele’s untitled film holds October 23 and will soak up cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely augmented by a mystery-first teaser plan and limited plot reveals that prioritize concept over plot.

Prestige-horror at year-end. Werwulf on December 25 is a line in sand that genre can play the holidays when packaged as prestige-leaning horror. Focus has done this before, slow-rolling, then working critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to keep the film in the conversation into January. If the film clicks critically, the studio can extend in the first week of 2027 while enjoying holiday hold and gift card usage.

Embedded title notes

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting in progress as production proceeds. Logline: Sidney returns to meet a new Ghostface while the narrative re-keys to the original film’s genome. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: classic-DNA reset with a current angle.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A mourning man’s intelligent companion grows into something fatal and romantic. Rating: TBA. Production: Completed principal photography for an early-year bow. Positioning: digital-age horror with pathos.

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 extends the world beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult surges in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Filmed consecutively with the first film. Positioning: revived prestige horror saga’s second leg.

Return to Silent Hill (Cineverse, January 23, 2026)
Director: Christophe Gans. Top cast: TBA in updated campaign materials. Logline: A man goes back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to encounter a changing reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Complete with theatrical path. Positioning: ambience-forward 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 demanding boss scramble to survive on a isolated island as the power balance of power inverts and dread encroaches. Rating: TBA. Production: Completed. Positioning: star-led survival piece from a genre icon.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles not yet announced in official materials. Logline: A modern reconception that returns the monster to horror, driven by Cronin’s in-camera craft and encroaching dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Locked. Positioning: classic monster relaunch with a filmmaker’s stamp.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A household haunting chiller that frames the panic through a little one’s shifting POV. Rating: TBA. Production: post-ready. Positioning: studio-backed, star-driven supernatural suspense.

Scary Movie 6 (Paramount, June 12, 2026)
Director: Michael Tiddes. Top cast: Anna Faris, Regina Hall, with the Wayans brothers participating creatively. Logline: {A satirical comeback that teases hot-button genre motifs and true-crime manias. Rating: TBD. Production: filming slated for fall 2025. Positioning: mass-audience summer option.

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 flares, with an overseas twist in tone and setting. Rating: pending. Production: production in New Zealand. Positioning: uncompromising R installment meant for big rooms.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: to be announced in marketing. Top cast: pending. Logline: The Further ripples again, with a new clan tethered to ancient dread. Rating: to be announced. Production: aiming to lens in summer ahead of late-summer bow. Positioning: steady supernatural brand in a historically strong slot.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: to be disclosed. Top cast: unrevealed. Logline: A new start designed to recalibrate the franchise from the ground up, with an focus on true survival horror over action spectacle. Rating: undetermined. Production: on a development track with locked window. Positioning: game-rooted reset with broad potential.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: undisclosed. Logline: intentionally withheld. Rating: undetermined. Production: in progress. Positioning: filmmaker event, teaser-driven.

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 elemental dread. Rating: not yet rated. Production: in preparation with Christmas frame locked. 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 traditional theatrical release planned before platforming. Status: window fluid, autumn forecast.

Why the moment is 2026

Three nuts-and-bolts forces inform this lineup. First, production that decelerated or reshuffled in 2024 needed slack in the schedule. Horror can fill those gaps quickly because scripts often are set in fewer locales, fewer large-scale digital sequences, 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 outperformed straight-to-streaming landings. Third, social conversation converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will lean on clippable moments from test screenings, select scare clips pegged to Thursday preview nights, and experiential pop-ups that generate creator assets. It is a repeatable playbook because it wins.

Calendar math also matters. Early-2026 family and superhero concentrations ease, providing runway for genre entries that can control a weekend or sit as the slightly older-skewing alternative. January is the prime example. Four different flavors of horror will share space across five weekends, which permits distinct conversations to flourish. Summer provides the other window. The send-up tracks alongside early family and action traffic, then the hard-R entry can benefit from a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Financials, ratings, and sleeper angles

Budgets remain in the ideal band. Most of the films above will come in under $40–$50 million, with many far below. That allows for expanded PLF presence 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 underdog chase continues in Q1, where modest-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 press those advantages. January could easily deliver the first shock 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. Anticipate a robust PVOD phase across the board, 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 rhythm and variety. January is a smorgasbord, February delivers a legacy slasher, April reanimates a Universal monster, May and June provide a two-beat supernatural run 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 hold talk and turnout without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can sequence upward, using earlier releases to seed the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors are pleased with the spacing. Horror delivers frequent Thursday-night spikes, right-sized allotments, and strong PLF uptake when the creative supports it. The 2026 slate has at least three titles that can command PLF, with The Mummy, Evil Dead Burn, and Werwulf all showcasing tactility, acoustics, and visual design 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, Ready To Roar

Schedules slip. Ratings change. Casts refresh. But the spine of 2026 horror is firm. There is brand gravity where needed, original vision where it matters, and a calendar that shows studios grasp the timing 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 closing-window arthouse pickup join the party. For now, the job is simple, cut crisp trailers, guard the secrets, and let the chills sell the seats.