Primordial Evil Emerges within Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed, a pulse pounding supernatural thriller, launching October 2025 across top digital platforms

One terrifying supernatural fright fest from writer / cinema craftsman Andrew Chiaramonte, summoning an mythic entity when guests become vehicles in a diabolical struggle. Dropping October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime Video, video-sharing site YouTube, Google’s digital store, iTunes Movies, Apple’s streaming platform, and Fandango at Home.

L.A., CA (August 8th, 2025) – steel yourselves for *Young & Cursed*, a disturbing story of resistance and ancient evil that will revamp horror this spooky time. Helmed by rising genre visionary Andrew Chiaramonte, this psychological and claustrophobic motion picture follows five lost souls who suddenly rise ensnared in a wilderness-bound dwelling under the menacing influence of Kyra, a troubled woman inhabited by a prehistoric biblical force. Be prepared to be gripped by a big screen ride that weaves together instinctive fear with biblical origins, streaming on Amazon’s streaming platform, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on October 2, 2025.


Cursed embodiment has been a classic fixture in film. In *Young & Cursed*, that belief is challenged when the entities no longer emerge from beyond, but rather deep within. This marks the darkest aspect of every character. The result is a intense emotional conflict where the intensity becomes a ongoing face-off between purity and corruption.


In a abandoned backcountry, five young people find themselves contained under the fiendish control and possession of a secretive character. As the characters becomes unresisting to withstand her will, marooned and pursued by creatures inconceivable, they are compelled to acknowledge their soulful dreads while the timeline relentlessly draws closer toward their expiration.


In *Young & Cursed*, mistrust surges and partnerships disintegrate, pushing each character to rethink their core and the philosophy of freedom of choice itself. The consequences escalate with every breath, delivering a chilling narrative that intertwines unearthly horror with soulful exposure.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my vision was to tap into ancestral fear, an entity born of forgotten ages, manifesting in inner turmoil, and confronting a spirit that erodes the self when we lose control.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Becoming Kyra meant evoking something beneath mortal despair. She is ignorant until the demon emerges, and that flip is terrifying because it is so deep.”

Where to Watch

*Young & Cursed* will be released for public screening beginning on October 2nd, 2025, on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango on-demand—making sure customers across the world can get immersed in this paranormal experience.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just rolled out a new second trailer for *Young & Cursed*, up to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a follow up to its release of trailer #1, which has attracted over a huge fan reaction.


In addition to its North American premiere, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has revealed that *Young & Cursed* will also be offered to international markets, bringing the film to a worldwide audience.


Join this visceral trip into the unknown. Watch *Young & Cursed* this horrific release to acknowledge these unholy truths about free will.


For previews, director cuts, and reveals straight from the filmmakers, follow @YoungAndCursed across media channels and visit our film’s homepage.





Current horror’s decisive shift: 2025 for genre fans U.S. rollouts integrates Mythic Possession, independent shockers, and tentpole growls

Across grit-forward survival fare infused with mythic scripture as well as series comebacks alongside incisive indie visions, 2025 stands to become the most variegated and carefully orchestrated year since the mid-2010s.

The 2025 horror calendar is not just busy, it is strategic. top-tier distributors set cornerstones through proven series, while subscription platforms front-load the fall with emerging auteurs set against legend-coded dread. Meanwhile, independent banners is surfing the afterglow from a top-tier 2024 festival cycle. Because Halloween stands as the showcase, the year beyond October is carefully apportioned. The early fall corridor has become the proving ground, distinctly in 2025, bookings reach January, spring, and mid-summer. Viewers are primed, studios are intentional, and 2025 could register as the most purpose-built year yet.

What Studios and Mini-Majors Are Doing: High-craft horror returns

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

Universal fires the first shot with an audacious swing: a refreshed Wolf Man, steering clear of the antique European village, but a sharp contemporary setting. From director Leigh Whannell anchored by Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner, this chapter binds the lycanthropy to domestic unraveling. The arc is bodily and domestic, about marriage, caregiving, and fragile humanity. landing in mid January, it advances a tactic to control the winter valley through premium horror, not dumps.

Spring sees the arrival of Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher novel refit as minimal menace. Directed by Eli Craig with Katie Douglas alongside Kevin Durand, it plays as blood lacquered Americana with satire under the paint. Behind its clown mask lies commentary on small town paranoia, generational divides, and mob justice. Initial fest notes point to real bite.

As summer eases, Warner’s schedule launches the swan song of its steadiest horror franchise: The Conjuring: Last Rites. Ed and Lorraine Warren return with Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson, the movie targets a resonant finish through an infamous case. Granted the structure is classic, Michael Chaves appears to favor a elegiac, inward tone here. It arrives early September, buying space before the October wave.

After that, The Black Phone 2. Initially pegged for early summer, an October berth implies conviction. Derrickson resumes command, and the memorable motifs return: vintage toned fear, trauma in the foreground, along with eerie supernatural rules. This run ups the stakes, with more excavation of the “grabber” canon and family hauntings.

Rounding the tentpole corner is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a title that can sell without classic marketing. The continuation widens the legend, expands its animatronic nightmare roster, while aiming for teen viewers and thirty something game loyalists. It books December, holding the cold season’s end.

SVOD Originals: Low budgets, big teeth

While theaters lean on names and sequels, streamers are taking risks, and it is paying off.

A leading ambitious platform entry is Weapons, a cold-case woven horror suite braiding three timelines tied to a mass vanishing. With Zach Cregger directing including Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, the release pairs unease with narrative heft. With a late summer theatrical bow and fall streaming drop, it looks primed to seed post watch analysis akin to Barbarian.

Playing chamber scale is Together, a close quarters body horror study starring Alison Brie and Dave Franco. Situated in an out of the way rental during a failed escape, the work maps love envy and self hatred onto bodily unraveling. It is romantic, grotesque, and deeply uncomfortable, a three act spiral into codependent hell. Even without a formal platform date, it is poised for a fall platform bow.

Also notable is Sinners, a 1930s period vampire folk story starring Michael B. Jordan. Captured with warm sepia and heavy biblical metaphor, it mirrors There Will Be Blood meeting Let the Right One In. The project looks at American religious trauma under a supernatural allegory. Early test screenings have marked it as one of the year’s most talked about streaming debuts.

Additional platform indies hold in reserve: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper each explores grief and disappearance and identity, opting allegory above bombast.

Possession, Deeper Than Ever: Young & Cursed

Rolling out October 2 across streaming, Young & Cursed presents a rare union, close in focus, wide in mythology. Written and directed by Andrew Chiaramonte, the story trails five strangers who come to in a far off forest cabin, ruled by Kyra, a young woman possessed by the ancient biblical demon Lilith. When darkness comes, Kyra’s power swells, a penetrating force tapping their private fears, soft spots, and remorse.

This fear is psychologically driven, pulsing with primal myth. Not another exorcism story reliant on Catholic rite and Latin phrase, this film taps something older, something darker. Lilith ignores rite, she wells up from trauma, quietude, and human weakness. An inward possession, not an outward spell, turns the trope and sets Young & Cursed inside a widening trend, intimate character work housed in genre.

The platforms, including Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play, and Fandango at Home, angle the film as Halloween counterprogramming to sequel load and monster re ups. It is a calculated bet. No overinflated mythology. No continuity burden. Sheer psychological unease, compact and taut, calibrated to digital binge beats. Among spectacle, Young & Cursed might win by restraint, then release.

Festival Born, Buyer Ready

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF continue to incubate the next six to twelve months of horror. They feel like launchpads now, not just showcases.

The Fantastic Fest slate for horror is strong this year. Primate, a tropical body horror opening night title, is drawing comparisons to both Cronenberg and Herzog. Whistle, a revenge folktale steeped in Aztec myth, is tapped to close with fire.

Midnight entries like If I Had Legs I’d Kick You are getting buzz not just for their titles but for their execution. That title, with A24 backing, satirizes toxic fandom during a convention lockdown and is set to pop.

SXSW premiered Clown in a Cornfield and introduced several microbudget hauntings currently circling deals. Sundance should deliver grief heavy elevated horror again, and Tribeca’s genre set plays urban, social, and surreal.

Festival playbooks now prize branding as much as discovery. The laurel is campaign ignition, not epilogue.

Legacy Horror: Additions, Do Overs, and Revisions

The legacy lineup looks stronger and more deliberate than prior years.

Fear Street: Prom Queen hits July to revive the 90s line with fresh lead and VHS 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, geared to push its techno horror story world with added characters and AI made scares. The opener’s social chatter and SVOD hours justify Universal’s deeper play.

The Long Walk adapts an early, scathing Stephen King work, led by Francis Lawrence, it shows as a grim dystopian parable set in survival horror, a youth walk ending only in death. If packaged well, it could track like The Hunger Games for horror adults.

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

Mythic lanes mainstream
From Lilith in Young & Cursed to Aztec curses in Whistle, creators turn to ancient texts and symbols. It eschews nostalgia to repossess pre Christian archetypes. Horror reaches past fear, it states evil is old.

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

Originals on platforms bite harder
Disposable horror filler days on platforms have passed. SVOD players fund strong scripts, proven directors, and real spend. Releases like Weapons and Sinners are elevated to events, not just content.

Festival hype becomes leverage
Festival ribbons become currency for better windows and top shelves. Forgo a festival map in 2025 and obscurity beckons.

Theaters are a trust fall
Studios release horror theatrically only when they believe in overperformance or sequel trees. The remainder goes PVOD or hybrid. Horror is not vanishing from theaters, it is getting curated.

Forecast: Fall crush plus winter X factor

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 including Bone Lake and Keeper will wrestle for room. Some may slide to early 2026 or switch platform lanes.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 locks December, while a late surprise on a platform remains possible. With mythic energy high, a late creature or exorcism entry could pop.

The trick lies in diverse menus finding segmented crowds, not single title bets. The brief is not the next Get Out, it is horror with afterlife beyond receipts.



The upcoming scare Year Ahead: returning titles, filmmaker-first projects, paired with A jammed Calendar designed for chills

Dek The upcoming genre calendar loads at the outset with a January cluster, thereafter stretches through the warm months, and carrying into the year-end corridor, braiding series momentum, new concepts, and strategic release strategy. Major distributors and platforms are committing to smart costs, theatrical leads, and social-fueled campaigns that turn these films into mainstream chatter.

The genre’s posture for 2026

This category has grown into the consistent lever in studio lineups, a vertical that can accelerate when it connects and still protect the drawdown when it fails to connect. After 2023 showed buyers that disciplined-budget pictures can command the discourse, the following year held pace with high-profile filmmaker pieces and sleeper breakouts. The upswing flowed into the 2025 frame, where revivals and premium-leaning entries showed there is a lane for a variety of tones, from returning installments to standalone ideas that carry overseas. The net effect for 2026 is a schedule that shows rare alignment across distributors, with intentional bunching, a spread of marquee IP and original hooks, and a recommitted strategy on exclusive windows that increase tail monetization on premium on-demand and home streaming.

Executives say the space now performs as a schedule utility on the rollout map. The genre can bow on virtually any date, provide a clear pitch for marketing and UGC-friendly snippets, and outstrip with ticket buyers that come out on advance nights and hold through the second weekend if the entry satisfies. After a work stoppage lag, the 2026 rhythm reflects trust in that model. The calendar launches with a loaded January lineup, then plants flags in spring and early summer for counterprogramming, while keeping space for a autumn stretch that connects to the Halloween corridor and past Halloween. The program also illustrates the ongoing integration of arthouse labels and OTT outlets that can nurture a platform play, fuel WOM, and roll out at the proper time.

An added macro current is brand management across interlocking continuities and classic IP. The players are not just producing another installment. They are seeking to position brand continuity with a must-see charge, whether that is a title design that conveys a refreshed voice or a casting pivot that binds a new installment to a vintage era. At the in tandem, the visionaries behind the marquee originals are championing hands-on technique, practical gags and specific settings. That mix provides the 2026 slate a confident blend of trust and unexpected turns, which is a pattern that scales internationally.

Studios and mini-majors: what the big players are doing

Paramount sets the tone early with two high-profile plays that sit at tonal extremes. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with Kevin Williamson in the lead and Neve Campbell back at the front, angling it as both a lineage transfer and a DNA-forward character-first story. Filming is underway in Atlanta, and the creative posture conveys a legacy-leaning mode without repeating the last two entries’ Carpenter-sisters arc. The studio is likely to mount a drive anchored in brand visuals, character-first teases, and a promo sequence hitting late fall. Distribution is theatrical through Paramount.

Paramount also reignites a once-mighty spoof franchise with Scary Movie 6 on June 12, 2026, directed by Michael Tiddes. Anna Faris and Regina Hall are paired again, with the Wayans brothers involved as creative contributors for the first time since the early 2000s, a headline the campaign will double down on. As a counterweight in summer, this one will pursue four-quadrant chatter through remixable clips, with the horror spoof format lending itself to quick redirects to whatever defines genre chatter that spring.

Universal has three specific strategies. SOULM8TE bows January 9, 2026, a digital-age offshoot from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The story engine is efficient, somber, and commercial: a grieving man installs an digital partner that evolves into a lethal partner. The date nudges it to the front of a competition-heavy month, with Universal’s campaign likely to mirror uncanny live moments and quick hits that interweaves love and fear.

On May 8, 2026, the studio places an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely rumored as the feature developed under working 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 creates space for a name unveil to become an fan moment closer to the initial promo. The timing creates a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles crowd different corridors.

Completing the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film claims October 23, 2026, a slot he has owned before. Peele’s releases are sold as signature events, with a minimalist tease and a later creative that establish tone without plot reveals the concept. The holiday-adjacent corridor opens a lane to dominate pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then work the copyright window to capture late-October interest at home.

Warner Bros., via New Line, works with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček helms, with Souheila Yacoub at the center. The franchise has repeatedly shown that a in-your-face, on-set effects led treatment can feel deluxe on a tight budget. Position this as a gore-forward summer horror blast that maximizes global rollout, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most world markets.

Sony’s horror bench is particularly deep. The studio launches two brand-forward plays in the back half. An untitled Insidious film debuts August 21, 2026, keeping a evergreen supernatural brand in the market while the spin-off branch progresses. Sony has reslotted on this title before, but the current plan aims it in late summer, where the brand has done well historically.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil reboots in what the studio is presenting as a ground-zero restart for its game-to-film powerhouse. With the PlayStation Productions pipeline now a central part of the studio’s strategy, this new take has a clearer mandate to serve both players and curious audiences. The fall slot lets Sony to build campaign creative around setting detail, and creature work, elements that can amplify premium format interest and fan-forward engagement.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, plants a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Robert Eggers’ Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film sustains the filmmaker’s run of period horror defined by historical precision and period language, this time set against lycan legends. The company has already locked the day for a holiday release, a signal of faith in Eggers as a specialty play that can broaden if early reception is robust.

How the platforms plan to play it

Platform plans for 2026 run on predictable routes. The Universal horror run transition to copyright after a big-screen and PVOD window, a ordering that expands both FOMO and sub growth in the tail. Prime Video blends acquired titles with worldwide buys and select theatrical runs when the data recommends it. Max and Hulu work their edges in library pulls, using seasonal hubs, genre hubs, and programmed rows to maximize the tail on lifetime take. Netflix stays opportunistic about Netflix films and festival deals, finalizing horror entries near launch and eventizing releases with tight-window plans. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, harnesses a two-step of precision releases and accelerated platforming that drives paid trials from buzz. That will matter for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before working niche channels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ treats carefully horror on a case-by-case basis. The platform has been willing to pick up select projects with accomplished filmmakers or star-driven packages, then give them a prestige theatrical in partnership with exhibitors to meet awards-qualifying thresholds or to earn receipts before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney’s domestic pipeline still uses the 20th Century Studios slate, a important element for monthly activity when the genre conversation ramps.

Indie corridors

Cineverse is curating a 2026 runway with two recognizable titles. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The sell is straightforward: the same brooding, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a cult hit, updated for modern audio and picture. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a autumn corridor, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. Cineverse has signaled a traditional theatrical plan for Legacy, an upbeat indicator for fans of the uncompromising series and for exhibitors in need of adult counterprogramming in the autumn stretch.

Focus will cultivate the auteur lane with Werwulf, curating the rollout through a fall festival swing if the cut is ready, then turning to the year-end corridor to expand. That positioning has been successful for filmmaker-driven genre with wider appeal. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not publicly set many dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines regularly gel after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A likely scenario is a brace of late-summer and fall platformers that can go wider if reception prompts. Anticipate an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that runs at Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work jointly, using select theatrical to kindle evangelism that fuels their subscriber base.

IP versus fresh ideas

By share, the 2026 slate skews toward the franchise column. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all activate marquee value. The question, as ever, is viewer burnout. The practical approach is to brand each entry as a fresh tone. Paramount is leading with relationship and legacy in Scream 7, Sony is teasing a fresh ground-up build for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is maximizing a French-tinted vision from a fresh helmer. Those choices matter when the audience has so many options and social sentiment spins fast.

Originals and director-driven titles provide the air. 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 survival-thriller premise with signature mischievous dread. SOULM8TE offers a precise, unnerving tech hook. Werwulf roots in era detail and an flinty tone. Even when the title is not based on a brand, the deal build is anchored enough to generate pre-sales and early previews.

Rolling three-year comps make sense of the approach. In 2023, a exclusive theatrical model that kept clean windows did not obstruct a hybrid test from hitting when the brand was sticky. In 2024, auteur craft horror popped in PLF auditoriums. In 2025, a rebirth of a beloved infection saga reminded the market that global horror franchises can still feel alive when they change perspective and raise the stakes. That last point is directly relevant to Sony’s 28 Years Later plan, which continues January 16, 2026 with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, this time directed by Nia DaCosta from a script by Alex Garland. The twin-shoot approach, with chapters produced back-to-back, provides the means for marketing to link the films through cast and motif and to sustain campaign assets without doldrums.

Production craft signals

The production chatter behind this slate hint at a continued turn toward physical, site-specific craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not track with any recent iteration of the property, a stance that aligns with the practical-effects sensibility he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film finished principal and is set for its April 17, 2026 date. Expect a campaign that underscores atmosphere and fear rather than whiz-bang spectacle, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership sustaining financial discipline.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has called Werwulf as the most forbidding project he has tackled, which tracks with a 13th-century milieu and medieval diction, a combination that can make for layered sound design and a spare, elemental mood on the big screen. Focus will likely warm the market to this aesthetic in deep-dive features and department features before rolling out a tease that centers atmosphere over story, a move that has clicked for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is engineered for practical nastiness, a signature of the series that sells overseas in red-band trailers and sparks shareable crowd-reaction snippets from early screenings. Scream 7 delivers a meta refresh that brings back the core lead. Resident Evil will win or lose on creature design and production design, which lend themselves to expo activations and planned releases. Insidious tends to be a theatrical sound showcase, click site with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the theatrical pitch feel key. Look for trailers that spotlight fine-grain sound, deep-bass stingers, and hush beats that explode in larger rooms.

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 bigger brand plays. The month finishes 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 meaningful, but the tone spread lets each find a lane, and the five-week structure allows a clean run for each if word of mouth carries.

Q1 into Q2 set up the summer. Scream 7 comes February 27 with fan warmth. In April, New Line’s The Mummy reawakens a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once was known for genre counterprogramming and now nurtures big openers. Universal’s untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 feeds summer while maintaining horror’s hold on early May weekends that are not claimed by superheroes or family tentpoles.

Summer heightens the contrast. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is lighter and broader, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 supplies gnarly intensity. The counterprogramming logic is coherent. The spoof can thrive next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest hits squarely for older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have rolled through premiums.

End of summer through fall leans franchise. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives the studio a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously excelled. Resident Evil follows September 18, a bridge slot that still preps for Halloween marketing beats. The Peele event books October 23 and will command cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely amplified by a slow-reveal plan and limited asset reveals that center concept over reveals.

Prestige-horror at year-end. Werwulf on December 25 is a marker that genre can stand up at Christmas when packaged as director prestige horror. The distributor 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 hits with critics, the studio can add screens in the first week of 2027 while turning holiday audiences and gift-card burn.

Title-by-title briefings, embedded in the narrative

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting continuing to be revealed as production rolls. Logline: Sidney returns to face a new Ghostface while the narrative revisits the original film’s founding notes. 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 loss-struck man’s AI companion turns into something murderously loving. Rating: TBA. Production: Principal is complete 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 grows the world beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult hardens in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Shot sequentially with the first film. Positioning: prestige apocalypse continuation.

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: Completed with U.S. theatrical distribution secured. Positioning: moody game adaptation built on atmosphere.

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 difficult boss claw to survive on a desolate island as the control balance tilts and unease intensifies. Rating: TBA. Production: Done. Positioning: celebrity-led survival horror from a legend.

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 renewed take that returns the monster to fear, built on Cronin’s practical effects and rising dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Principal 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 in-home haunting scenario that interrogates the chill of a child’s fragile senses. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: in the can. Positioning: studio-backed and star-fronted haunting thriller.

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 spoof revival that targets modern genre fads and true crime fascinations. Rating: to be announced. Production: cameras due to roll fall 2025. Positioning: wide-lane seasonal counterprogram.

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 breaks out, with an transnational twist in tone and setting. Rating: TBD. Production: principal photography in New Zealand. Positioning: R-rated franchise charge tuned for PLF.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: TBA in marketing materials. Top cast: unrevealed. Logline: The Further stirs again, with a new clan bound to ancient dread. Rating: forthcoming. Production: set for summer production targeting late-summer opening. Positioning: bankable spirit-world IP in a proven lane.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: forthcoming. Top cast: forthcoming. Logline: A fresh restart designed to rebuild the franchise from the ground up, with an emphasis on survival-first horror over action-heavy spectacle. Rating: TBA. Production: development underway with firm date. Positioning: canon-conscious reboot with mainstream reach.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: unrevealed. Logline: intentionally withheld. Rating: forthcoming. Production: proceeding. 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 raw menace. Rating: forthcoming. Production: in active prep with holiday date set. Positioning: specialty holiday horror poised for crafts recognition.

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 classic theatrical rollout before platforming. Status: timing TBD, fall window eyed.

Why this year, why now

Three practical forces structure this lineup. First, production that hiccuped or shuffled in 2024 required schedule breathing room. Horror can patch those gaps promptly because scripts often rely on fewer locations, fewer large-scale effects sequences, and pared-down timelines. Second, studios have become more disciplined 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 premieres. Third, online chatter converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will leverage meme-ready beats from test screenings, precision scare clips launched on Thursday previews, and experiential pop-ups that power influencer posts. It is a repeatable playbook because it wins.

Calendar math also matters. Family and superhero corridors are not as densely packed in early 2026, clearing runway for genre entries that can capture a weekend or stand as the older-leaning counter. January is the prime example. Four distinct flavors of horror will jostle across five weekends, which lets WOM accrue cleanly. Summer provides the other window. The spoof can draft behind animation and action in early summer, then the hard-R entry can capitalize on a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Money matters, ratings, and surprise hits

Budgets remain in the optimal band. Most of the films above will sit beneath the $40–$50 million band, with many far below. That allows for heavy premium placement 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 breakout hunt continues in Q1, where value-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 harvest those lanes. January could easily deliver the first quiet breakout 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. Project a sturdy PVOD period across titles, since horror fans have shown a willingness to pay for convenience after an opening weekend, especially when word of mouth is strong.

How the viewing year plays

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers tempo and variety. January is a buffet, February delivers a legacy slasher, April brings back a Universal monster, May and June provide a back-to-back supernatural punch 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 austere, literate nightmare. That is how you keep chatter alive and occupancy strong without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can ratchet upward, using earlier releases to condition the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors are pleased with the spacing. Horror delivers predictable Thursday surges, tight deployments, and strong PLF uptake when the creative supports it. The 2026 slate has at least three titles that can justify premium screens, with The Mummy, Evil Dead Burn, and Werwulf all showcasing detail, sound field, and visuals 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 Looks Exciting

Schedules slip. Ratings change. Casts rotate. But the spine of 2026 horror is solid. There is IP strength where it matters, creative ambition where it counts, and a calendar that shows studios understand how and when audiences want to be scared. 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 last-minute boutique pickup join the party. For now, the job is simple, cut crisp trailers, keep secrets, and let the frights sell the seats.