Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed awakens primeval malevolence, a spine tingling horror feature, bowing October 2025 on global platforms

A haunting supernatural nightmare movie from literary architect / movie maker Andrew Chiaramonte, releasing an timeless horror when outsiders become vehicles in a hellish ceremony. Available October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime Video, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes Movies, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home.

Los Angeles, CA (August 8, 2025) – stay alert for *Young & Cursed*, a frightful portrayal of survival and archaic horror that will revamp the fear genre this fall. Directed by rising cinematic craftsman Andrew Chiaramonte, this unsettling and cinematic motion picture follows five figures who find themselves imprisoned in a remote cabin under the menacing sway of Kyra, a haunted figure inhabited by a ancient biblical demon. Steel yourself to be ensnared by a visual display that blends soul-chilling terror with timeless legends, dropping on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on the second of October, 2025.


Malevolent takeover has been a legendary trope in genre filmmaking. In *Young & Cursed*, that concept is redefined when the entities no longer come from a different plane, but rather internally. This symbolizes the most sinister corner of the players. The result is a emotionally raw mental war where the story becomes a unforgiving push-pull between virtue and vice.


In a abandoned no-man's-land, five youths find themselves cornered under the ominous aura and infestation of a unidentified female figure. As the group becomes submissive to escape her influence, abandoned and followed by powers unnamable, they are obligated to face their worst nightmares while the deathwatch harrowingly moves toward their dark fate.


In *Young & Cursed*, mistrust swells and alliances dissolve, driving each cast member to reconsider their existence and the integrity of volition itself. The intensity amplify with every beat, delivering a terror ride that fuses otherworldly suspense with human vulnerability.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my vision was to evoke core terror, an malevolence from prehistory, working through our weaknesses, and confronting a spirit that questions who we are when stripped of free will.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Transforming into Kyra was about accessing something rooted in terror. She is insensitive until the control shifts, and that pivot is harrowing because it is so personal.”

Streaming Launch Details

*Young & Cursed* will be accessible for home viewing beginning from October 2, 2025, on Prime Video, Google’s video hub, Google’s store, Apple iTunes, Apple’s streaming platform, and Fandango at Home—giving watchers around the globe can survive this spine-tingling premiere.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just broadcast a new second trailer for *Young & Cursed*, currently showing to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a additional glimpse to its intro video, which has pulled in over a viral response.


In addition to its continental debut, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has broadcast that *Young & Cursed* will also be available worldwide, extending the thrill to a global viewership.


Witness this soul-jarring trip into the unknown. Watch *Young & Cursed* this October the 2nd to see these fearful discoveries about the human condition.


For bonus footage, director cuts, and press updates from the story's source, follow @YoungAndCursed across social media and visit the official website.





Contemporary horror’s inflection point: the 2025 season stateside slate interlaces Mythic Possession, microbudget gut-punches, paired with legacy-brand quakes

Across survival horror steeped in biblical myth as well as legacy revivals alongside keen independent perspectives, 2025 is tracking to be the most textured and blueprinted year in a decade.

The 2025 horror calendar is not just busy, it is strategic. studio majors bookend the months with established lines, at the same time subscription platforms front-load the fall with new voices paired with mythic dread. In the indie lane, the artisan tier is riding the carry of a record-setting 2024 festival season. Given Halloween is the centerpiece, the remaining months are slotted with surgical care. The autumn corridor is the classic sprint, and now, horror is also claiming January, spring, and even mid-summer. Fans are ravenous, studios are precise, and 2025 may be recorded as the genre’s most deliberate campaign.

Major Studio Plans with Mini-Major Flex: Premium dread reemerges

The majors are not coasting. If 2024 set the stage for reinvention, 2025 deepens the push.

the Universal banner fires the first shot with a big gambit: a contemporary Wolf Man, stepping away from the classic old-country village, in an immediate now. From director Leigh Whannell with Christopher Abbott opposite Julia Garner, this cut welds lycanthropy to home turmoil. The transformation is not just physical, it is marital, parental, and painfully human. Slated 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.

The spring frame introduces Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher page-to-screen distilled into spare horror. Eli Craig directs with Katie Douglas alongside Kevin Durand, it runs as red stained heartland dread with sharp satire. Under the costume, it needles small town fear, cross generational rifts, and crowd punishment. Festival whispers say it is sharp.

Toward summer’s end, Warner’s pipeline drops the final chapter from its bankable horror series: The Conjuring: Last Rites. With Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson returning as Ed and Lorraine Warren, the chapter points to emotional capstone while addressing a headline case. Even if the pattern is recognizable, Chaves is expected to tune it to a grieving, self reflective color. It sits in early September, securing daylight before October saturation.

The Black Phone 2 follows. It was eyed for early summer, and shifting to October telegraphs confidence. Derrickson resumes command, and the tone that worked before is intact: nostalgic menace, trauma as text, and a cold supernatural calculus. The bar is raised this go, by digging further into the “grabber” mythos and grief’s generational echo.

Rounding the tentpole corner is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a movie that scarcely needs conventional ads. The sequel leans deeper into its lore, adds to the animatronic nightmare bench, with a bullseye on teens and thirty something nostalgics. It hits in December, locking down the winter tail.

Streaming Offerings: Slim budgets, major punch

While theaters lean on names and sequels, streamers are trying sharper edges, and buzz accrues.

Among the most ambitious streaming plays is Weapons, a cold file multi story chiller threading three timelines via a mass disappearance. Guided by Zach Cregger with Josh Brolin opposite Julia Garner, the project unites horror with dramatic charge. Opening theatrically late summer ahead of fall SVOD, it looks primed to seed post watch analysis akin to Barbarian.

On the more intimate flank sits Together, a tight space body horror vignette starring Alison Brie and Dave Franco. Confined to a lonely rental when a vacation turns, the film explores what happens when love, envy, and self hatred merge into physical decay. It is romantic, grotesque, and deeply uncomfortable, a three act spiral into codependent hell. Though no platform has officially staked a release date, it is tracking toward an autumn slot.

On the docket is Sinners, a thirties era vampire folk parable starring Michael B. Jordan. Framed in sepia richness with 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. Trial screenings frame it as a high chatter SVOD arrival.

Several other streaming indies are quietly waiting in the wings: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper all mine grief and vanishing and identity, running metaphor first.

Possession Underneath: Young & Cursed

Dropping October 2 across all major streaming platforms, Young & Cursed emerges as a rare mix, tight in frame and epic in resonance. Written and helmed 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. As the night settles, her power spikes, an infiltrating force leveraging fears, breaks, and sorrow.

The dread here runs psychological, charged by primal myth. Rather than another exorcism film centered on Catholic rites or Latin incantations, this one bores into something older, something darker. Lilith does not answer ceremony, she climbs through trauma, hush, and human fracture. Making possession internal threads Young & Cursed into the current of intimate character studies in genre skin.

Platforms such as Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play, and Fandango at Home position the film as a Halloween counter to sequel heavy theatricals and monster revivals. It is a calculated bet. No puffed out backstory. No canon weight. Simply psychological fear, lean and taut, built for the binge then recover rhythm. With a spectacle heavy year, Young & Cursed may pop by going quiet, then screaming.

Festival Born and Buyer Ready

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF remain the hothouse where next season’s horror grows. They are more runway than museum.

Fantastic Fest has a thick horror program this time. Primate, a tropical body horror curtain raiser, invites Cronenberg Herzog comp. Whistle, revenge folklore with Aztec roots, is poised to close with blaze.

At midnight, entries like If I Had Legs I’d Kick You buzz for how they play, not only their names. That one, an A24 backed satire on toxic fandom set during a horror convention lockdown, is poised for breakout status.

SXSW bowed Clown in a Cornfield while feeding deal chatter for microbudget haunts. 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. A badge from Fantastic Fest or TIFF is now the first phase of marketing, not the last.

Legacy Lines: Follow Ups, Restarts, and Reframes

The legacy slate is stronger, and more deliberate, than in recent years.

Fear Street: Prom Queen returns in July, reviving the 90s franchise with new lead and retro color. Unlike prior entries, this one leans into camp and prom night melodrama. Bring tiaras, red dye, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 returns in late June, with a plan to deepen its techno horror mythos via new characters and AI terrors. The initial entry’s meme life and streaming legs push Universal to scale up.

Another headline is The Long Walk, adapting a grim early Stephen King piece, led by Francis Lawrence, it reads as a brutal dystopian allegory inside survival horror, a walk till you drop competition for kids with no winners. With clear targeting, it could become The Hunger Games for horror grown ups.

Additionally, reboots and sequels, among them Hell House LLC: Lineage, V/H/S/Halloween, The Toxic Avenger, and Anaconda, populate the months, with timing held for strategy or acquisitions.

Trends to Watch

Mythic dread mainstreams
Lilith in Young & Cursed and Aztec curses in Whistle point to ancient texts and symbols. This trend avoids nostalgia, reclaiming pre Christian archetypes. Horror goes beyond fright, it notes evil’s age.

Body horror ascends again
With Together, Weapons, and Keeper, the genre goes back to the flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation, these are the new metaphors for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

Streaming Originals Grow Teeth
The days of disposable horror filler on digital platforms are over. SVOD players fund strong scripts, proven directors, and real spend. Films like Weapons and Sinners are treated as events, not content.

Badges become bargaining chips
Festival seals operate as leverage for distribution lanes and press windows. A horror film without a festival strategy in 2025 risks disappearing.

Theaters are a trust fall
Studios are only releasing horror theatrically if they believe it will overperform or spin into sequels. Other titles pivot PVOD or hybrid. Horror keeps theatrical presence, via curation.

Near Term Outlook: Autumn crowding, winter surprise

A cluster of Young & Cursed, The Conjuring: Last Rites, The Black Phone 2, and Weapons in September and October equals saturation. Indies, including Bone Lake and Keeper, will battle for oxygen. Do not be surprised if one or two move to early 2026 or switch platforms.

December centers on Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, but a final weeks surprise stream could still hit. Since big films lean mythic, a final monster or exorcism play can claim space.

What matters is slate breadth meeting fractured audiences, not one crown jewel. The assignment is not to chase the next Get Out, it is to build horror that endures beyond box office.



The coming 2026 spook release year: Sequels, Originals, in tandem with A busy Calendar Built For chills

Dek The upcoming scare slate packs immediately with a January crush, following that extends through the warm months, and carrying into the festive period, combining franchise firepower, inventive spins, and calculated calendar placement. Studio marketers and platforms are prioritizing cost discipline, big-screen-first runs, and social-driven marketing that turn genre releases into water-cooler talk.

Where horror stands going into 2026

This space has emerged as the sturdy option in distribution calendars, a space that can expand when it resonates and still mitigate the floor when it doesn’t. After the 2023 year showed buyers that modestly budgeted chillers can own mainstream conversation, 2024 kept energy high with signature-voice projects and quiet over-performers. The trend flowed into 2025, where revivals and arthouse crossovers signaled there is space for diverse approaches, from sequel tracks to original one-offs that carry overseas. The end result for the 2026 slate is a programming that is strikingly coherent across the market, with clear date clusters, a mix of known properties and novel angles, and a reinvigorated commitment on release windows that enhance post-theatrical value on premium digital and home streaming.

Buyers contend the genre now slots in as a fill-in ace on the programming map. The genre can arrive on virtually any date, yield a easy sell for teasers and short-form placements, and outperform with fans that arrive on Thursday previews and return through the subsequent weekend if the movie hits. On the heels of a work stoppage lag, the 2026 rhythm telegraphs comfort in that dynamic. The year begins with a front-loaded January band, then plants flags in spring and early summer for genre counterpoints, while saving space for a September to October window that pushes into Halloween and afterwards. The calendar also reflects the tightening integration of arthouse labels and OTT outlets that can nurture a platform play, create conversation, and move wide at the precise moment.

A parallel macro theme is series management across linked properties and long-running brands. Studios are not just releasing another next film. They are working to present continuity with a heightened moment, whether that is a art treatment that telegraphs a re-angled tone or a star attachment that threads a new installment to a vintage era. At the in tandem, the visionaries behind the eagerly awaited originals are doubling down on in-camera technique, makeup and prosthetics and site-specific worlds. That interplay hands the 2026 slate a healthy mix of home base and newness, which is how the genre sells abroad.

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

Paramount leads early with two centerpiece pushes that straddle tones widely. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with original architect Kevin Williamson in the director seat and Neve Campbell back at the front, angling it as both a handoff and a return-to-roots character study. Principal photography is underway in Atlanta, and the tonal posture signals a fan-service aware campaign without covering again the last two entries’ core arc for the Carpenter sisters. Count on a promo wave centered on brand visuals, character spotlights, and a tease cadence slated for late fall. Distribution is cinema-first via Paramount.

Paramount also brings back a once-mighty spoof franchise with Scary Movie 6 on June 12, 2026, directed by Michael Tiddes. Anna Faris and Regina Hall are back on screen, with the Wayans brothers involved as creative partners for the first time since the early 2000s, a headline the campaign will double down on. As a summer contrast play, this one will build large awareness through viral-minded bites, with the horror spoof format making room for quick pivots to whatever tops pop-cultural buzz that spring.

Universal has three unique releases. SOULM8TE debuts January 9, 2026, a AI-tinged spinoff from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The story engine is tight, grief-rooted, and elevator-pitch-ready: a grieving man sets up an synthetic partner that turns into a deadly partner. The date slots it at the front of a front-loaded month, with Universal’s campaign likely to renew viral uncanny stunts and short-form creative that blurs devotion and creep.

On May 8, 2026, the studio schedules an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely assumed to be the feature developed under working titles in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The official slate currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which preserves a public title to become an event moment closer to the debut look. The timing gives the studio a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles crowd different corridors.

Completing the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film secures October 23, 2026, a slot he has thrived in before. Peele’s work are branded as signature events, with a minimalist tease and a second beat that shape mood without giving away the concept. The pre-Halloween slot allows Universal to lead pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then press 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 leads, with Souheila Yacoub fronting. The franchise has shown that a blood-soaked, on-set effects led method can feel premium on a lean spend. Frame it as a blood-and-grime summer horror rush that embraces global rollout, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most world markets.

Sony’s horror bench is well stocked. The studio launches two marquee IP entries in the back half. An untitled Insidious film debuts August 21, 2026, carrying a dependable supernatural brand in motion while the spin-off branch progresses. The studio has moved dates on this title before, but the current plan sets it in late summer, where Insidious has shown strength.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil reappears in what Sony is selling as a reset for its game-to-film powerhouse. With the PlayStation Productions pipeline now a foundational part of the studio’s strategy, this new take has a mission to serve both core fans and newcomers. The fall slot provides the studio time to build materials around mythos, and creature work, elements that can lift large-format demand and fandom activation.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, pins a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film carries forward Eggers’ run of period horror built on immersive craft and historical speech, this time exploring werewolf lore. Focus’s team has already announced the holiday for a holiday release, a clear message in Eggers as a specialty play that can scale widely if early reception is favorable.

Streamers and platform exclusives

Platform strategies for 2026 run on proven patterns. Universal’s genre slate window into copyright after a cinema and premium rental phase, a ordering that expands both FOMO and viewer acquisition in the late-window. Prime Video will mix outside acquisitions with global originals and limited runs in theaters when the data backs it. Max and Hulu accent their strengths in library engagement, using timely promos, Halloween hubs, and curated rows to extend momentum on aggregate take. Netflix keeps options open about originals and festival buys, timing horror entries toward the drop and making event-like premieres with burst campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, operates a tiered of targeted cinema placements and swift platform pivots that converts buzz to sign-ups. That will be meaningful for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before pivoting to fan funnels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ keeps selective horror on a per-project basis. The platform has been willing to buy select projects with recognized filmmakers or name-led packages, then give them a boutique theatrical in partnership with exhibitors to meet Oscar thresholds or to gather buzz before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney domestic still leans on the 20th Century Studios slate, a important input for sustained usage when the genre conversation heats up.

Indie and specialty outlook

Cineverse is crafting a 2026 runway with two brand-forward moves. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The promise is direct: the same foggy, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a cult item, reimagined for modern mix and grade. 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 signaled a wide-to-platform plan for Legacy, an promising marker for fans of the uncompromising series and for exhibitors in need of adult counterprogramming in the autumn weeks.

Focus will work the auteur lane with Werwulf, curating the rollout through the fall circuit if the cut is ready, then relying on the Christmas window to open out. That positioning has worked well for filmmaker-driven genre with mainstream crossovers. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not posted many 2026 dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines regularly gel after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A solid projection is a brace of late-summer and fall platformers that can go wider if reception justifies. Plan on an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that screens at Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work in parallel, using limited theatrical to ignite evangelism that fuels their subs.

IP versus fresh ideas

By share, the 2026 slate bends toward the legacy column. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all leverage name recognition. The risk, as ever, is staleness. The operating solution is to package each entry as a tone reset. Paramount is elevating character-first legacy in Scream 7, Sony is teasing a clean-slate build for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is highlighting a French-inflected take from a buzzed-about director. Those choices make a difference when the audience has so many options and social sentiment moves quickly.

Non-franchise titles and director-first projects supply the oxygen. Jordan Peele’s October film will be marketed as a brand unto itself. Sam Raimi’s Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, features Rachel McAdams in a island survival premise with that teasing menace. SOULM8TE offers a tight, eerie tech hook. Werwulf anchors in period detail and an unsparing tone. Even when the title is not based on a property, the configuration is recognizable enough to translate curiosity into advance sales and advance-audience nights.

Recent comps make sense of the playbook. In 2023, a big-screen-first plan that kept clean windows did not stop a simultaneous release test from hitting when the brand was robust. In 2024, director-craft horror hit big in large-format rooms. In 2025, a return of a beloved infection saga reminded the market that global horror franchises can still feel revitalized when they shift POV and raise the stakes. That last point is directly relevant to Sony’s 28 Years Later plan, which moves forward January 16, 2026 with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, this time directed by Nia DaCosta from a script by Alex Garland. The two-film strategy, with chapters shot back-to-back, gives leeway to marketing to link the films through personae and themes and to keep assets in-market without extended gaps.

Aesthetic and craft notes

The craft conversations behind the upcoming entries telegraph a continued lean toward tactile, place-driven craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not resemble any recent iteration of the property, a stance that aligns with the physical-effects weblink bias he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film wrapped photography and is on track for its April 17, 2026 date. The push will likely that highlights tone and tension rather than VFX blitz, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership enabling budget rigor.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has characterized Werwulf as the most shadowed project he has tackled, which tracks with a period English setting and era-true language, a combination that can make for enveloping sound design and a earthy, elemental chill on the big screen. Focus will likely showcase this aesthetic in feature stories and craft spotlights before rolling out a atmospheric tease that leans on mood over plot, a move that has performed for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is designed for gross-out texture, a signature of the series that travels well in red-band trailers and spurs shareable crowd-reaction snippets from early screenings. Scream 7 targets a meta recalibration that brings back the core lead. Resident Evil will fly or stall on creature design and production design, which are ideal for con floor moments and guarded reveals. Insidious tends to be a audio showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the auditorium case feel irresistible. Look for trailers that elevate disciplined sound, deep-bass stingers, and mute beats that land in premium houses.

Calendar cadence

January is busy. Universal’s SOULM8TE opens January 9, 2026, then Sony returns a week later with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple on January 16. Cineverse’s Return to Silent Hill follows on January 23, a gloomy counterbalance amid marquee brands. The month closes 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 serious, but the mix of tones affords lanes to each, and the five-week structure offers clean runway for each if word of mouth sustains.

Late winter and spring stage summer. Scream 7 hits February 27 with nostalgia energy. In April, New Line’s The Mummy restores a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once was aligned with genre counterprogramming and now backs big openers. Universal’s untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 bridges into summer while maintaining horror’s hold on early May weekends that are not claimed by superheroes or family tentpoles.

Summer splits the lanes. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is jokier and broader, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 brings gnarly intensity. The counterprogramming logic is workable. The spoof can connect next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest feeds older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have moved through premium slots.

End of summer through fall leans brand. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives Sony a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously done well. Resident Evil steps in after September 18, a pre-October slot that still feeds into Halloween marketing beats. Jordan Peele’s untitled film occupies October 23 and will absorb cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely supported by a mystery-driven teaser strategy and limited teasers that trade in concept over detail.

Awards-adjacent specialty. Werwulf on December 25 is a statement that genre can compete at Christmas when packaged as awards-flirting horror. The distributor has done this before, staging carefully, then capitalizing on critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to stay top of mind into January. If the film scores with critics, the studio can expand in the first week of 2027 while turning holiday audiences and gift-card use.

One-sentence dossiers

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting still being revealed as production moves. Logline: Sidney returns to meet a new Ghostface while the narrative revisits the original film’s genes. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: roots-first with a today edge.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A widowed man’s algorithmic partner escalates into something romantically lethal. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming finished for an early-year bow. Positioning: AI chiller with a human heart.

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: Filmed consecutively with the first film. Positioning: prestige survival-horror 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 warped reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Locked and U.S. theatrical booked. Positioning: tone-first game adaptation.

Send Help (20th Century Studios, January 30, 2026)
Director: Sam Raimi. Top cast: Rachel McAdams, Dylan O’Brien, Dennis Haysbert, Chris Pang. Logline: After a plane crash, an employee and her hard-edged boss push to survive on a far-flung island as the pecking order shifts and paranoia spreads. Rating: TBA. Production: Principal done. Positioning: marquee survival piece from a master.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles in the vault in official materials. Logline: A modern reimagining that returns the monster to fright, rooted in Cronin’s practical effects and oozing dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Completed. Positioning: monster revival with signature voice.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A residential haunting scenario that twists the panic of a child’s inconsistent impressions. Rating: forthcoming. Production: picture-locked. Positioning: studio-supported and star-fronted eerie suspense.

Scary Movie 6 (Paramount, June 12, 2026)
Director: Michael Tiddes. Top cast: Anna Faris, Regina Hall, with the Wayans brothers involved creatively again. Logline: {A satirical comeback that teases of-the-moment horror beats and true crime fixations. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: lensing scheduled 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 flares, with an multinational twist in tone and setting. Rating: TBA. Production: currently 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: to be announced. Logline: The Further widens again, with a young family snared by past horrors. Rating: undetermined. Production: set for summer production targeting late-summer opening. Positioning: steady supernatural brand in a historically strong slot.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: to be disclosed. Top cast: unrevealed. Logline: A ground-up reset designed to reconstruct the franchise from the ground up, with an center of gravity in pure survival horror over set-piece spectacle. Rating: TBD. Production: in development with a locked date. Positioning: game-rooted reset with broad potential.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: pending. Logline: closely held. Rating: not yet rated. Production: proceeding. 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 period language and raw menace. Rating: forthcoming. Production: in preproduction for holiday debut. 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 cinema-first path before platforming. Status: date in flux, fall expected.

Why 2026, why now

Three practical forces calibrate this lineup. First, production that hiccuped or re-sequenced in 2024 needed slack in the schedule. Horror can move in swiftly because scripts often require limited locations, fewer large-scale effects sequences, and shorter schedules. Second, studios have become more measured about windows. Theatrical exclusivity remains the goal for most of these films, followed by PVOD and then platform streaming, a sequence that has consistently outpaced straight-to-streaming premieres. Third, platform buzz converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will capitalize on social-ready stingers from test screenings, select scare clips timed to Thursday night previews, and experiential pop-ups that power influencer posts. It is a repeatable playbook because it works.

There is also the slotting calculus. Early-year family and superhero blocks are thinner in 2026, leaving useful real estate for genre entries that can seize a weekend or function as the older-skew counter. January is the prime example. Four horror lanes will trade weekends across five weekends, which allows chatter to build title by title. Summer provides the other window. The lampoon benefits from family and action buoyancy, then the hard-R entry can make hay in a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Cost, ratings, and sleeper dynamics

Budgets remain in the Goldilocks zone. Most of the films above will track under the $40–$50 million range, 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 dark-horse hunt continues in Q1, where low-to-mid budget genre can own weekends with minimal competition, and again in late summer, where horror often becomes the conversation when tentpoles tire. The 2026 slate is set up to leverage those opportunities. January could easily deliver the first stealth overachiever 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. Expect a healthy 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 pace and range. January is a spread, February delivers a legacy slasher, April restores a Universal monster, May and June provide a paranormal one-two for date nights and group outings, July leans brutal, 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 maintain buzz and butts in seats without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can ratchet upward, using earlier releases to warm up the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

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

A Robust 2026 On Deck

Schedules slip. Ratings change. Casts refresh. But the spine of 2026 horror is in place. There is brand heft where it matters, inventive vision where it helps, and a calendar that shows studios get how and when audiences want 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 final-hour specialty addition join the party. For now, the job is simple, roll out exact trailers, keep secrets, and let the fear sell the seats.