Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed summons antediluvian malevolence, a nightmare fueled thriller, debuting Oct 2025 across top streaming platforms

This spine-tingling otherworldly nightmare movie from creator / director Andrew Chiaramonte, triggering an timeless curse when newcomers become victims in a hellish ordeal. Debuting October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime, YouTube streaming, Google’s Play platform, Apple’s iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango platform.

L.A., CA (August 8th, 2025) – gear up for *Young & Cursed*, a traumatizing journey of continuance and primeval wickedness that will remodel the horror genre this ghoul season. Guided by rising director to watch Andrew Chiaramonte, this gritty and claustrophobic story follows five unacquainted souls who are stirred stuck in a unreachable house under the ominous grip of Kyra, a haunted figure controlled by a timeless scriptural evil. Get ready to be hooked by a filmic journey that integrates intense horror with mythic lore, streaming on Amazon’s streaming platform, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on October 2, 2025.


Malevolent takeover has been a time-honored concept in film. In *Young & Cursed*, that concept is challenged when the monsters no longer arise externally, but rather from their psyche. This illustrates the most primal shade of each of them. The result is a relentless mind game where the tension becomes a relentless tug-of-war between good and evil.


In a abandoned terrain, five souls find themselves sealed under the dark rule and haunting of a shadowy female presence. As the victims becomes incapacitated to fight her command, disconnected and stalked by terrors mind-shattering, they are forced to wrestle with their raw vulnerabilities while the hours relentlessly ticks toward their destruction.


In *Young & Cursed*, mistrust amplifies and teams shatter, requiring each soul to contemplate their personhood and the integrity of autonomy itself. The consequences climb with every tick, delivering a cinematic nightmare that harmonizes ghostly evil with raw emotion.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my objective was to dive into primal fear, an curse rooted in antiquity, influencing psychological breaks, and confronting a will that strips down our being when robbed of choice.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Living Kyra meant evoking something more primal than sorrow. She is insensitive until the invasion happens, and that evolution is emotionally raw because it is so raw.”

Where to Watch

*Young & Cursed* will be streamed for public screening beginning from October 2, 2025, on Amazon’s platform, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango on-demand—making sure horror lovers worldwide can watch this terrifying film.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just published a new sneak peek #2 for *Young & Cursed*, online to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a sequel to its first trailer, which has earned over strong viewer count.


In addition to its regional launch, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has informed that *Young & Cursed* will also be taken worldwide, delivering the story to viewers around the world.


Be sure to catch this bone-rattling fall into madness. Tune into *Young & Cursed* this horrific release to experience these haunting secrets about the soul.


For film updates, set experiences, and news from the cast and crew, follow @YoungCursedOfficial across Instagram and Twitter and visit the film’s website.





Contemporary horror’s sea change: 2025 across markets U.S. release slate weaves old-world possession, Indie Shockers, plus brand-name tremors

Moving from fight-to-live nightmare stories infused with scriptural legend and stretching into series comebacks set beside sharp indie viewpoints, 2025 is shaping up as the most dimensioned combined with deliberate year for the modern era.

The 2025 horror calendar is not just busy, it is strategic. major banners bookend the months via recognizable brands, simultaneously OTT services saturate the fall with first-wave breakthroughs set against scriptural shivers. At the same time, festival-forward creators is fueled by the echoes from an unprecedented 2024 fest surge. Because Halloween continues as the prize window, the surrounding weeks are charted with intent. The early fall corridor has become the proving ground, yet in 2025, strategies include January, spring, and mid-summer. Viewers are primed, studios are disciplined, as a result 2025 may end up the most intentional cycle yet.

Studio Chessboard and Mini-Major Plays: Elevated fear reclaims ground

The majors are not coasting. If 2024 prepared the terrain, 2025 doubles down.

Universal’s slate kicks off the frame with a risk-forward move: a reimagined Wolf Man, not returning to the Gothic European hamlet, in a clear present-tense world. Under director Leigh Whannell anchored by Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner, this approach fixes the lycanthropy within intimate rupture. The turn is more than creature work, it is about marriage, parenthood, and humanity. targeting mid January, it advances a tactic to control the winter valley through premium horror, not dumps.

Spring delivers Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher page-to-screen distilled into spare horror. Steered by Eli Craig and featuring Katie Douglas and Kevin Durand, it comes as grit laced American nightmare with sardonic edge. Behind its clown mask lies commentary on small town paranoia, generational divides, and mob justice. First wave buzz indicates sharp teeth.

At summer’s close, Warner’s pipeline launches the swan song of its most reliable 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, Chaves is expected to tune it to a grieving, self reflective color. It sits in early September, securing daylight before October saturation.

Following that is The Black Phone 2. Originally slated for early summer, its move to an October release suggests confidence. Derrickson returns to the helm, and the DNA that clicked last time remains: nostalgic menace, trauma driven plotting, along with eerie supernatural rules. The stakes escalate here, with a deeper exploration into the “grabber” mythology and how grief haunts generations.

Finishing the tentpole list is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a movie that scarcely needs conventional ads. The return delves further into myth, builds out the animatronic fear crew, with a bullseye on teens and thirty something nostalgics. It opens in December, anchoring horror’s winter tail.

SVOD Originals: Slim budgets, major punch

While cinemas swing on series strength, streamers are swinging risk forward, and returns look strong.

One standout ambitious title is Weapons, a long shadow anthology of dread stitching three periods attached to a mass disappearance. Under Zach Cregger and featuring Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, the release pairs unease with narrative heft. Posting late summer theatrically then fall streaming, it stands to prompt frame-by-frame breakdowns as with Barbarian.

More contained by design is Together, an intimate body horror unraveling featuring Alison Brie opposite Dave Franco. Situated in an out of the way rental during a failed escape, the movie follows love and envy and self denial into corporeal breakdown. It reads tender, repulsive, and intensely uneasy, a three act churn into codependent hell. Even without a formal platform date, it is virtually assured for fall.

Then there is Sinners, a thirties set vampire folk saga led by Michael B. Jordan. Photographed in sepia saturation with biblical metaphor, it suggests There Will Be Blood blended with Let the Right One In. The story probes American religious trauma by way of supernatural allegory. Early test screens tag it as a top talked streaming debut.

A cluster of streaming indies sits ready: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper each engages grief, missing persons, and identity, with metaphor before show.

Deep Possession Currents: Young & Cursed

Bowing October 2 on major streamers, Young & Cursed emerges as a rare mix, tight in frame and epic in resonance. Conceived and directed by Andrew Chiaramonte, the arc centers on five strangers who wake inside a backcountry cabin, beneath Kyra’s command, a young woman possessed by the ancient biblical demon Lilith. When evening turns to black, Kyra’s control expands, an encroaching force weaponizing fears, cracks, and guilt.

The terror is psychological in engine, alive with primal myth. Skipping the exorcism norm of Catholic rite and Latin line, this one bores into something older, something darker. Lilith is not summoned by priests, she rises from trauma, muteness, and human fault lines. By making possession inward rather than external, Young & Cursed joins a trend toward intimate character studies masked as genre.

The Halloween window on Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play, and Fandango at Home frames the film as counter to sequel saturation and creature revivals. It is a clever angle. No puffed out backstory. No IP hangover. Just psychological dread, contained and tense, tailored to the binge then breathe cadence of digital horror fans. In the noise, Young & Cursed could cut through by staying hushed, then erupting.

Festival Born, Buyer Ready

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF continue to incubate the next six to twelve months of horror. They are increasingly launchpads rather than showcases.

The Fantastic Fest slate for horror is strong this year. Primate, a tropical body horror curtain raiser, invites Cronenberg Herzog comp. Whistle, a folkloric revenge piece in Aztec lore, likely shuts the fest with heat.

Midnight entries like If I Had Legs I’d Kick You are getting buzz not just for their titles but for their execution. That film, an A24 backed satire of toxic fandom inside a horror convention lockdown, looks poised to break out.

SXSW bowed Clown in a Cornfield while feeding deal chatter for microbudget haunts. Sundance likely lifts another batch of grief laced elevated horror, while Tribeca’s genre yard leans urban, social, and surreal.

In 2025, festival strategy is less about discovery, more about branding. A badge from Fantastic Fest or TIFF is now the first phase of marketing, not the last.

Series Horror: Reups, Reboots, and Rethinks

The franchise bench is sturdier and more targeted than lately.

Fear Street: Prom Queen hits July to revive the 90s line with fresh lead and VHS vibe. In contrast to earlier chapters, it skews camp and prom night melodrama. Visualize tiaras, fake gore, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 returns in late June, set to enlarge techno horror mythology with fresh faces and AI bred menaces. The initial entry’s meme life and streaming legs push Universal to scale up.

Also on deck is The Long Walk, from an early, punishing Stephen King work, helmed by Francis Lawrence, it is a brutal dystopian allegory wrapped in survival horror, a kids walking until they die competition with no real winners. If sold right, it could sit as The Hunger Games for adult horror fans.

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.

Dials to Watch

Mythic lanes mainstream
Lilith in Young & Cursed and Aztec curses in Whistle point to ancient texts and symbols. This is less nostalgia, more reclamation of pre Christian archetypes. Horror does more than scare, it reminds that evil predates us.

Body horror comes roaring back
Pieces such as Together, Weapons, and Keeper bring it back to flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation, these are the new metaphors for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

Originals on platforms bite harder
Junk fill horror on platforms is receding. Platforms are putting money into scripts, directors, and promotion. Entries like Weapons and Sinners get event treatment, not inventory.

Festival hype becomes leverage
Badges are functional, they buy theatrical access, prime placement, and cycles. Without a festival strategy in 2025, a horror film risks vanishing.

Big screen is a trust fall
The big screen goes to those expected to beat comps or build series. Most others angle PVOD or hybrid. Horror continues in theaters, in narrower curated lanes.

Season Ahead: Fall pileup, winter curveball

The combination of Young & Cursed, The Conjuring: Last Rites, The Black Phone 2, and Weapons across September and October saturates fall. Indies like Bone Lake and Keeper must claw for air. There may be pivots into early 2026 or across platforms.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 anchors December, and a surprise streaming drop could still arrive late. Because major titles skew dark and mythic, a late creature feature or exorcism could slide in.

Horror’s 2025 outcome will be decided not by one title, but by how its variety connects with splintered audiences. The plan is not to clone Get Out, it is to craft horror that lives on beyond box office.



The approaching terror release year: continuations, new stories, plus A jammed Calendar calibrated for frights

Dek The new genre year stacks immediately with a January crush, and then runs through summer, and straight through the holiday frame, combining name recognition, fresh ideas, and shrewd offsets. Studios and streamers are leaning into mid-range economics, theatrical exclusivity first, and platform-native promos that transform genre titles into four-quadrant talking points.

How the genre looks for 2026

The genre has established itself as the consistent counterweight in annual schedules, a vertical that can grow when it performs and still buffer the risk when it stumbles. After 2023 reminded top brass that mid-range entries can own cultural conversation, the following year sustained momentum with filmmaker-forward plays and word-of-mouth wins. The run moved into 2025, where reboots and awards-minded projects signaled there is space for several lanes, from sequel tracks to director-led originals that carry overseas. The end result for the 2026 slate is a calendar that is strikingly coherent across the market, with planned clusters, a balance of known properties and novel angles, and a re-energized stance on release windows that feed downstream value on PVOD and home streaming.

Planners observe the horror lane now operates like a swing piece on the calendar. The genre can kick off on almost any weekend, provide a clear pitch for teasers and reels, and punch above weight with crowds that show up on Thursday nights and maintain momentum through the subsequent weekend if the release delivers. Post a production delay era, the 2026 pattern exhibits comfort in that approach. The slate kicks off with a loaded January window, then exploits spring through early summer for contrast, while keeping space for a September to October window that connects to holiday-adjacent weekends and into November. The schedule also highlights the stronger partnership of arthouse labels and subscription services that can platform a title, spark evangelism, and scale up at the precise moment.

An added macro current is brand strategy across connected story worlds and long-running brands. The companies are not just greenlighting another installment. They are working to present lineage with a must-see charge, whether that is a logo package that signals a re-angled tone or a talent selection that anchors a new installment to a foundational era. At the simultaneously, the auteurs behind the headline-grabbing originals are doubling down on tactile craft, practical gags and place-driven backdrops. That interplay delivers the 2026 slate a strong blend of known notes and novelty, which is why the genre exports well.

The majors’ 2026 approach

Paramount fires first with two front-of-slate plays that live at opposite ends of the tone spectrum. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with Kevin Williamson in the director slot and Neve Campbell back at the heart, positioning the film as both a baton pass and a return-to-roots character-focused installment. Production is active in Atlanta, and the narrative stance announces a classic-referencing mode without repeating the last two entries’ family thread. Expect a marketing push stacked with iconic art, early character teases, and a promo sequence timed to late fall. Distribution is Paramount’s theatrical route.

Paramount also resurrects 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 partners for the first time since the early 2000s, a hook the campaign will double down on. As a off-tentpole summer play, this one will chase broad awareness through social-friendly gags, with the horror spoof format lending itself to quick shifts to whatever horror tops the discourse that spring.

Universal has three distinct strategies. SOULM8TE debuts January 9, 2026, a tech-horror spinoff from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The premise is elegant, somber, and commercial: a grieving man installs an digital partner that becomes a dangerous lover. The date places it at the front of a packed window, with Universal’s marketing likely to reprise off-kilter promo beats and brief clips that threads intimacy and chill.

On May 8, 2026, the studio slots an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely rumored as the feature developed under early labels in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The public calendar currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which preserves a title drop to become an teaser payoff closer to the early tease. The timing creates a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles take the main frames.

Rounding out the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film takes October 23, 2026, a slot he has owned before. His entries are positioned as signature events, with a teaser with minimal detail and a later creative that define feel without revealing the concept. The Halloween-adjacent date affords Universal to saturate pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then leverage the copyright window to capture late-October interest at home.

Warner Bros., via New Line, collaborates with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček heads, with Souheila Yacoub at the center. The franchise has established that a visceral, hands-on effects style can feel deluxe on a controlled budget. Frame it as a red-band summer horror blast that spotlights international play, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most global territories.

Sony’s horror bench is loaded. The studio rolls out two marquee IP entries in the back half. An untitled Insidious film premieres August 21, 2026, holding a dependable supernatural brand in the market while the spin-off branch advances. Sony has reshuffled on this title before, but the current plan sticks it in late summer, where Insidious has shown strength.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil re-emerges in what Sony is calling 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 charge to serve both core fans and general audiences. The fall slot offers Sony space to build marketing units around universe detail, and creature builds, elements that can increase large-format demand and community activity.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, positions a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film sustains the filmmaker’s run of period horror shaped by rigorous craft and language, this time exploring werewolf lore. Focus’s team has already reserved the holiday for a holiday release, a signal of faith in Eggers as a specialty play that can move wide if early reception is favorable.

SVOD and PVOD rhythms

Platform tactics for 2026 run on established tracks. Universal’s genre entries feed copyright after a theater window then PVOD, a cadence that fortifies both FOMO and sub growth in the back half. Prime Video pairs outside acquisitions with global originals and qualifying theatrical engagements when the data signals it. Max and Hulu work their edges in archive usage, using seasonal hubs, horror hubs, and editorial rows to stretch the tail on 2026 genre cume. Netflix keeps flexible about original films and festival deals, scheduling horror entries on shorter runways and turning into events rollouts with surge campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, works a staged of selective theatrical runs and prompt platform moves that drives paid trials from buzz. That will be material for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before pressing genre-fan funnels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ adopts case-by-case posture for horror on a case-by-case basis. The platform has signaled readiness to secure select projects with established auteurs or headline-cast packages, then give them a art-house footprint in partnership with exhibitors to meet awards-qualifying thresholds or to build credibility before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney’s domestic pipeline still draws on the 20th Century Studios slate, a key factor for subscriber stickiness when the genre conversation surges.

Boutique label prospects

Cineverse is steadily assembling a 2026 pipeline with two brand plays. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The setup is simple: the same moody, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a genre cult touchstone, retooled 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. The distributor has announced a cinema-first plan for the title, an healthy marker for fans of the gritty series and for exhibitors looking for R-rated counterplay in the late stretch.

Focus will lean into the auteur lane with Werwulf, stewarding the film through fall festivals if the cut is ready, then deploying the holiday frame to go wider. That positioning has helped for director-led genre with four-quadrant hopes. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not finalized many 2026 slots in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines generally solidify after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A likely scenario is a set of late-summer and fall platformers that can expand if reception encourages. Look for 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 in concert, using mini theatrical to prime evangelism that fuels their subscriber base.

Franchise entries versus originals

By count, the 2026 slate bends toward the brand-heavy side. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all exploit marquee value. The caveat, as ever, is brand wear. The workable fix is to market each entry as a renewed feel. Paramount is foregrounding character-first legacy in Scream 7, Sony is signaling a ground-zero restart for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is driving a Francophone tone from a rising filmmaker. Those choices move the needle when the audience has so many options and social sentiment spins fast.

Non-franchise titles and director-first projects keep oxygen in the system. Jordan Peele’s October film will be framed as a brand unto itself. Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, centers Rachel McAdams in a island-set survival premise with Raimi’s impish dread. SOULM8TE offers a lean, creepy tech hook. Werwulf grounds itself in period and an stark tone. Even when the title is not based on a recognizable brand, the assembly is known enough to accelerate early sales and Thursday-night crowds.

The last three-year set frame the model. In 2023, a exclusive window model that observed windows did not hamper a day-date move from paying off when the brand was robust. In 2024, craft-first auteur horror punched above its weight in premium large format. In 2025, a resurgence of a beloved infection saga reminded the market that global horror franchises can still feel reinvigorated when they reframe POV 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 linked-chapter plan, with chapters lensed sequentially, enables marketing to interlace chapters through personae and themes and to maintain a flow of assets without doldrums.

How the look and feel evolve

The shop talk behind the year’s horror indicate a continued bias toward physical, site-specific craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not play like any recent iteration of the property, a stance that squares with the prosthetic-forward taste he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film closed principal and is tracking to its April 17, 2026 date. Watch for a drive that leans on unease and texture rather than thrill-ride spectacle, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership allowing tight cost control.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has talked about Werwulf as the most severe project he has tackled, which tracks with a feudal backdrop and era-correct language, a combination that can make for deep sound design and a cold, elemental mood on the big screen. Focus will likely preview this aesthetic in long-lead features and below-the-line spotlights before rolling out a tease that leans on mood over plot, a move that has clicked for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is aimed at visceral gnarl, a signature of the series that works internationally in red-band trailers and gathers shareable screening reactions from early screenings. Scream 7 offers a meta reframe that re-centers the original lead. Resident Evil will rise or fall on creature work and production design, which align with booth activations and timed asset drops. Insidious tends to be a sound design showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the big-screen case feel key. Look for trailers that foreground razor sound, deep-bass stingers, and dead-air cuts that land in premium houses.

Month-by-month map

January is packed. 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 buttons with Send Help on January 30 via 20th Century Studios, a island survival chiller from Sam Raimi that puts a star forward in Rachel McAdams. The competition here is real, but the tonal variety ensures lanes for each, and the five-week structure enables clean play for each if word of mouth stays strong.

Post-January through spring set up the summer. Paramount’s Scream 7 rolls out February 27 with legacy momentum. In April, The Mummy reawakens a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once was home to genre counterprogramming and now supports big openers. Universal’s untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 rolls into 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 jokier and broader, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 serves brutal intensity. The counterprogramming logic is tight. The spoof can succeed next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest serves older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have run their PLF course.

Late-season stretch leans recognizable. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives the studio a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously clicked. Resident Evil slides in after September 18, a early fall window that still ties into Halloween marketing beats. Jordan Peele’s untitled film occupies October 23 and will command cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely amplified by a opaque tease strategy and limited pre-release reveals that put concept first.

Holiday prestige and specialty. Werwulf on December 25 is a line in sand that genre can hold in the holidays when packaged as awards-flirting horror. The distributor has done this before, selective rollout, then leaning on critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to extend talk into January. If the film clicks critically, the studio can add screens in the first week of 2027 while building on holiday impulse and gift card usage.

Film-by-film briefs

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting ongoing as production continues. Logline: Sidney returns to take on a new Ghostface while the narrative revisits the original film’s DNA. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: heritage pivot with a current edge.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A mourning man’s algorithmic partner becomes something murderously loving. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming finished for an early-year bow. Positioning: tech shocker with heart.

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple (Sony, news 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 broadens the canvas beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult surges 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 journeys back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to meet a warped reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Completed and U.S. theatrical set. Positioning: atmospheric 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 unyielding boss claw to survive on a uninhabited island as the control dynamic upends and fear crawls. Rating: TBA. Production: In the can. Positioning: A-list survival chiller from a master.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles not yet announced in official materials. Logline: A renewed take that returns the monster to nightmare, anchored by Cronin’s practical craft and encroaching dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Production wrapped. Positioning: monster revival with signature voice.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A domestic haunting chiller that interrogates the fright of a child’s shaky senses. Rating: rating pending. Production: picture-locked. 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 re-engaging creatively. Logline: {A send-up revival that riffs on modern genre fads and true-crime crazes. Rating: TBD. Production: shoot planned for fall 2025. Positioning: broad summer counterprogrammer.

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 detonates, with an multinational twist in tone and setting. Rating: pending. Production: lensing in New Zealand. Positioning: graphic series entry optimized for PLF.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: awaiting reveal. Top cast: pending. Logline: The Further opens again, with a another family caught in long-buried horrors. Rating: undetermined. Production: slated for summer production leading to late-summer release. Positioning: bankable spirit-world IP in a proven lane.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: to be disclosed. Top cast: forthcoming. Logline: A reboot designed to re-establish the franchise from the ground up, with an lean toward survivalist horror over action pyrotechnics. Rating: forthcoming. Production: advancing in development with date locked. Positioning: game-grounded refresh with wider appeal.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: pending. Logline: purposely secretive. Rating: TBD. Production: ongoing. Positioning: auteur event powered by teasers.

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 era-faithful speech and ancient menace. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: building toward Christmas Day opening. Positioning: auteur prestige horror aimed at holiday corridor with crafts prospects.

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 big-screen run before platforming. Status: date shifting, fall likely.

Why the moment is 2026

Three nuts-and-bolts forces structure this lineup. First, production that decelerated or reshuffled in 2024 required runway on the datebook. Horror can slot in fast because scripts often are location-light, fewer large-scale VFX set pieces, and compressed schedules. Second, studios have become more strict 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 releases. Third, platform buzz converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will lean on meme-ready beats from test screenings, orchestrated scare clips dropping on Thursday previews, and experiential pop-ups that spark influencer coverage. It is a repeatable playbook because it works.

Factor four is the scheduling calculus. Family and cape-heavy lanes thin out in early 2026, providing runway for genre entries that can command a weekend or function as the older-skew counter. January is the prime example. Four separate horror flavors will stack across five weekends, which keeps buzz lanes tidy. Summer provides the other window. The parody aligns with early family and action waves, then the hard-R entry can leverage a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Cost, ratings, and sleeper dynamics

Budgets remain in the target range. Most of the films above will track under the $40–$50 million range, with many far below. That allows for broad premium screen use 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 cost-efficient 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 unexpected 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. 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.

How the viewing year plays

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers beat and breadth. January is a spread, February delivers a legacy slasher, April reawakens a Universal monster, May and June provide a two-beat supernatural run for date nights and group outings, July gets visceral, August and September keep the supernatural momentum, October turns into a Jordan Peele event, and December invites a chilly, literate nightmare. That is how you sustain heat and footfall without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can gain momentum, using earlier releases to prime the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors welcome the spacing. Horror delivers preview-night pops, efficient placements, 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 materiality, sonics, 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.

A Robust 2026 On Deck

Dates shift. Ratings change. Casts reconfigure. But the spine of 2026 horror is intact. There is brand power where it counts, auteur intent where it matters, and a calendar that shows studios meet the timing for scares. The awards and festival pipeline into 2027 will come into focus once the fall festivals lock, and it would not be surprising to see at least one late-arriving specialty entry join the party. For now, the job is simple, deliver taut trailers, lock the reveals, and let the fear sell the seats.