Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed releases antediluvian malevolence, a chilling supernatural thriller, bowing October 2025 across top digital platforms

A bone-chilling mystic scare-fest from creator / filmmaker Andrew Chiaramonte, setting free an archaic force when unfamiliar people become vehicles in a devilish ordeal. Going live this October 2nd, 2025, on Amazon Prime, Google’s YouTube, Google’s Play platform, iTunes Movies, Apple TV+, and Fandango streaming.

Los Angeles, CA (August 8, 2025) – gear up for *Young & Cursed*, a traumatizing tale of struggle and age-old darkness that will reimagine the horror genre this ghoul season. Visualized by rising creative mind Andrew Chiaramonte, this tense and atmospheric feature follows five figures who are stirred caught in a off-grid lodge under the menacing dominion of Kyra, a mysterious girl dominated by a millennia-old sacrosanct terror. Be prepared to be ensnared by a filmic ride that harmonizes visceral dread with timeless legends, premiering on Prime Video, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on October 2, 2025.


Malevolent takeover has been a long-standing fixture in screenwriting. In *Young & Cursed*, that concept is subverted when the malevolences no longer descend from a different plane, but rather from within. This depicts the shadowy aspect of all involved. The result is a psychologically brutal inner struggle where the intensity becomes a brutal conflict between good and evil.


In a isolated wilderness, five young people find themselves confined under the ghastly rule and haunting of a elusive person. As the group becomes paralyzed to escape her command, exiled and stalked by unknowns indescribable, they are compelled to battle their raw vulnerabilities while the deathwatch without pity ticks onward toward their death.


In *Young & Cursed*, anxiety surges and ties crack, urging each survivor to question their true nature and the idea of freedom of choice itself. The stakes climb with every second, delivering a frightening tale that fuses supernatural terror with soulful exposure.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my narrative plan was to tap into deep fear, an force rooted in antiquity, operating within soul-level flaws, and navigating a spirit that tests the soul when autonomy is removed.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Stepping into Kyra required summoning something beyond human emotion. She is in denial until the evil takes hold, and that conversion is terrifying because it is so emotional.”

Watch the Horror Unfold

*Young & Cursed* will be launched for streaming beginning October 2, 2025, on Amazon’s platform, Google’s video hub, Google’s store, iTunes, Apple’s streaming platform, and Fandango on-demand—so that subscribers across the world can face this paranormal experience.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just launched a new trailer update for *Young & Cursed*, debuted to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a sequel to its first preview, which has attracted over a hundred thousand impressions.


In addition to its first availability, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has announced that *Young & Cursed* will also be streamed globally, offering the tale to a global viewership.


Don’t miss this cinematic ride through nightmares. Confront *Young & Cursed* this day of reckoning to witness these ghostly lessons about free will.


For featurettes, special features, and announcements from Chiaramonte Films, follow @YoungAndCursedFilm across online outlets and visit youngandcursed.com.





American horror’s inflection point: calendar year 2025 U.S. lineup melds biblical-possession ideas, microbudget gut-punches, plus brand-name tremors

Running from survivor-centric dread suffused with scriptural legend and including installment follow-ups as well as pointed art-house angles, 2025 is tracking to be the genre’s most multifaceted combined with precision-timed year in the past ten years.

The 2025 horror calendar is not merely full, it is methodical. Top studios lock in tentpoles through proven series, in parallel streaming platforms load up the fall with discovery plays paired with scriptural shivers. At the same time, festival-forward creators is carried on the carry of a record-setting 2024 festival season. Because Halloween continues as the prize window, the non-October slots are tuned with exactness. The fall stretch is the proving field, and now, rollouts stretch into January, spring, and mid-summer. Viewers are primed, studios are exacting, so 2025 could register as the most purpose-built year yet.

Studio and Mini-Major Strategies: Prestige-leaning dread rebounds

The majors are not coasting. If 2024 planted the seeds, 2025 scales the plan.

Universal’s slate lights the fuse with a marquee bet: a contemporary Wolf Man, steering clear of the antique European village, in a modern-day environment. Directed by Leigh Whannell with Christopher Abbott alongside Julia Garner, this cut welds lycanthropy to home turmoil. The turn is more than creature work, it is about marriage, parenthood, and humanity. landing in mid January, it is part of the new strategy to own the box office’s winter dead zone with prestige horror instead of dumping ground thrillers.

By spring, Clown in a Cornfield premieres, a YA slasher adaptation reframed as lean dread. Led by Eli Craig featuring turns by Katie Douglas and Kevin Durand, it comes as grit laced American nightmare with sardonic edge. Beneath the facade, it probes hometown suspicion, boomer to zoomer divides, and mob retribution. Advance murmurs say it draws blood.

At summer’s close, Warner Bros. Pictures delivers the closing chapter from its anchor horror saga: The Conjuring: Last Rites. Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson again portray Ed and Lorraine Warren, the movie targets a resonant finish through an infamous case. While the template is known, director Michael Chaves is said to bring a more mournful, introspective tone to the series swan song. It is dated for early September, granting margin before October’s crush.

Then comes The Black Phone 2. Planned for early summer, the October reposition reads assertive. Derrickson re boards, and the tone that worked before is intact: old school creep, trauma as narrative engine, and a cold supernatural calculus. Here the stakes rise, by digging further into the “grabber” mythos and grief’s generational echo.

Rounding the tentpole corner is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a property whose brand does the lifting. The second outing goes deeper into backstory, stretches the animatronic parade, and targets both teens and thirtysomething fans of the original game. It lands in December, pinning the winter close.

Streaming Originals: Economy, maximum dread

As theatrical skews franchise first, platforms are wagering boldly, and results are there.

A leading ambitious platform entry is Weapons, a multi timeline cold-case dread piece knitting three time bands around a mass vanishing. Directed by Zach Cregger including Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, the piece merges terror with dramatic mass. Arriving to cinemas late summer then to streamers in fall, it is poised to inspire think pieces and forums, echoing Barbarian.

Playing chamber scale is Together, a room scale body horror descent anchored by Alison Brie and Dave Franco. Fixed in a remote let as a weekend curdles, the film explores what happens when love, envy, and self hatred merge into physical decay. It reads tender, repulsive, and intensely uneasy, a three act churn into codependent hell. Though no platform has officially staked a release date, it is a near certain autumn drop.

Also notable is Sinners, a 1930s period vampire folk story with Michael B. Jordan. Framed in sepia richness with biblical metaphor, it suggests There Will Be Blood blended with Let the Right One In. The title explores American religious trauma through supernatural symbol. Advance tests paint it as a watercooler streamer.

A handful of other streaming indies hover in the wings: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper each threads grief and absence and identity, mapping allegory to dread.

Possession Runs Deep: Young & Cursed

Landing October 2 across key streamers, Young & Cursed positions itself as a rare hybrid, intimate in scope and mythic in reach. Scripted and led by Andrew Chiaramonte, the release shadows five strangers waking in a hidden woods cabin, bound to Kyra, a young woman possessed by the ancient biblical demon Lilith. As night descends, so does Kyra’s power, an invasive force that exploits their deepest fears, weaknesses, and regrets.

This fear is psychologically driven, pulsing with primal myth. Avoiding the usual exorcism path with Catholic ritual and Latin spell, this one burrows toward something older, something darker. Lilith arrives not by rite, but through trauma, silence, and human fragility. This inside out possession reframes expectation and groups Young & Cursed with a rising current, intimate character dramas within genre.

The film is positioned on Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play, and Fandango at Home as Halloween balance against sequel stacks and creature returns. That is a savvy move. No overstuffed canon. No series drag. Simply psychological fear, lean and taut, built for the binge then recover rhythm. Against fireworks, Young & Cursed might stand apart by stillness, then shock.

Festival Heat to Market Leverage

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF remain the hothouse where next season’s horror grows. This cycle, they are launchpads first and showcases second.

Fantastic Fest fields a robust horror set this year. Primate, a tropical body horror opener, draws comparisons to Cronenberg and Herzog. Whistle, a folkloric revenge piece in Aztec lore, likely shuts the fest with heat.

Midnight fare like If I Had Legs I’d Kick You rides on craft as well as title. That title, with A24 backing, satirizes toxic fandom during a convention lockdown and is set to pop.

SXSW staged Clown in a Cornfield and lined up microbudget haunts for talks. Sundance is expected to unspool its usual crop of grief soaked elevated horror, and Tribeca’s genre box tilting urban, social, and surreal.

Strategy at festivals now equals branding as well as discovery. Laurels now light the fuse, they do not just adorn.

Franchise Horror: Follow Ups, Restarts, and Reframes

The franchise bench is sturdier and more targeted than lately.

Fear Street: Prom Queen brings back the 90s line in July with a new lead and throwback vibe. Unlike earlier entries, this leans camp and prom night melodrama. Picture tiaras, bright red goo, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 opens late June, targeting a broadened techno horror canon with new characters and AI spawned nightmares. The first film’s success on both social media and streaming has given Universal the confidence to double down.

Another headline is The Long Walk, adapting a grim early Stephen King piece, with Francis Lawrence directing, it operates as a bleak dystopian tale masked as survival horror, a walk off to death for kids. If framed properly, it could echo The Hunger Games for adult horror.

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.

Signals and Trends

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

Body horror returns
Pieces such as Together, Weapons, and Keeper bring it back to flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation are standing in for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

SVOD originals harden up
The days of disposable horror filler on digital platforms are over. Platforms invest in real scripts, real directors, and real campaigns. Titles such as Weapons and Sinners are treated as events, not mere content.

Laurels convert to leverage
Festival laurels are no longer ornamental, they are leverage for theatrical release, premium placement, and media cycles. No festival plan in 2025, and disappearance looms.

Theatrical becomes a trust fall
Studios release horror theatrically only when they believe in overperformance or sequel trees. The balance slides PVOD or hybrid. Horror persists theatrically, in curated lanes.

Near Term Outlook: Fall stack and winter swing card

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 will scrap for air. Watch for one or more of these to pivot into early 2026 or shift platforms.

With Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 in December, a stealth streamer drop might pop near year end. Given the dark, mythic lean of the year’s big films, a final creature feature or exorcism slot is open.

The hinge is broad reach to atomized viewers, not single tentpoles. The plan is not to clone Get Out, it is to craft horror that lives on beyond box office.



The next Horror Year Ahead: brand plays, Originals, And A stacked Calendar engineered for shocks

Dek: The new scare season packs immediately with a January traffic jam, then runs through June and July, and carrying into the winter holidays, fusing name recognition, untold stories, and savvy counterplay. The big buyers and platforms are relying on efficient budgets, big-screen-first runs, and social-driven marketing that position the slate’s entries into four-quadrant talking points.

The genre’s posture for 2026

Horror filmmaking has proven to be the bankable play in release plans, a segment that can expand when it resonates and still safeguard the floor when it misses. After the 2023 year re-taught studio brass that modestly budgeted entries can shape the discourse, the following year held pace with high-profile filmmaker pieces and slow-burn breakouts. The carry fed into the 2025 frame, where reboots and festival-grade titles demonstrated there is a lane for multiple flavors, from ongoing IP entries to fresh IP that travel well. The result for 2026 is a lineup that looks unusually coordinated across players, with intentional bunching, a spread of familiar brands and original hooks, and a reinvigorated attention on cinema windows that fuel later windows on premium on-demand and platforms.

Distribution heads claim the horror lane now works like a fill-in ace on the rollout map. Horror can premiere on a wide range of weekends, provide a easy sell for spots and reels, and outperform with ticket buyers that show up on Thursday nights and return through the week two if the release delivers. Exiting a work stoppage lag, the 2026 plan underscores comfort in that playbook. The year commences with a stacked January corridor, then leans on spring and early summer for counterweight, while reserving space for a September to October window that connects to holiday-adjacent weekends and into the next week. The calendar also features the increasing integration of specialized imprints and streamers that can platform and widen, generate chatter, and broaden at the strategic time.

A further high-level trend is IP cultivation across ongoing universes and classic IP. The companies are not just making another return. They are moving to present story carry-over with a sense of event, whether that is a typeface approach that suggests a new vibe or a ensemble decision that reconnects a new installment to a vintage era. At the in tandem, the visionaries behind the headline-grabbing originals are embracing physical effects work, real effects and location-forward worlds. That fusion affords the 2026 slate a smart balance of familiarity and discovery, which is how the films export.

How the majors and mini-majors are programming

Paramount establishes early momentum with two spotlight pushes that straddle tones widely. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with Kevin Williamson in the helm and Neve Campbell back at the spine, steering it as both a succession moment and a DNA-forward character-focused installment. The shoot is ongoing in Atlanta, and the story approach suggests a nostalgia-forward framework without repeating the last two entries’ Carpenter-sisters arc. The studio is likely to mount a drive anchored in recognizable motifs, 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 joining up again, with the Wayans brothers involved in creative roles for the first time since the early 2000s, a campaign lever the campaign will feature. As a summer counter-slot, this one will go after general-audience talk through share-ready beats, with the horror spoof format allowing quick pivots to whatever dominates genre chatter that spring.

Universal has three unique releases. SOULM8TE bows January 9, 2026, a universe branch from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The core idea is tight, heartbroken, and elevator-pitch-ready: a grieving man sets up an algorithmic mate that grows into a fatal companion. The date locates it at the front of a competition-heavy month, with marketing at Universal likely to renew uncanny-valley stunts and bite-size content that melds longing and foreboding.

On May 8, 2026, the studio dates an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely assumed to be the feature developed under code names 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 title reveal to become an attention spike closer to the initial promo. The timing offers Universal a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles crowd different corridors.

Anchoring the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film grabs October 23, 2026, a slot he has thrived in before. The filmmaker’s films are framed as marquee events, with a minimalist tease and a second beat that define feel without revealing the concept. The holiday-adjacent corridor creates space for Universal to take pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then activate the copyright window to capture late-October interest at home.

Warner Bros., via New Line, links with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček heads, with Souheila Yacoub in the lead. The franchise has made clear that a gritty, practical-effects forward treatment can feel big on a efficient spend. Position this as a viscera-heavy summer horror blast that centers overseas performance, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most international territories.

Sony’s horror bench is robust. The studio rolls out two brand-forward plays in the back half. An untitled Insidious film arrives August 21, 2026, maintaining a evergreen supernatural brand on the grid while the spin-off branch builds quietly. Sony has adjusted timing on this title before, but the current plan plants it in late summer, where Insidious has shown strength.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil re-enters in what Sony is marketing as a ground-zero restart for its game-to-film powerhouse. With the PlayStation Productions pipeline now a core part of the studio’s strategy, this new take has a clearer mandate to serve both devotees and fresh viewers. The fall slot affords Sony time to build campaign creative around mythos, and creature work, elements that can boost PLF interest and cosplay-friendly fan engagement.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, books a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film continues the filmmaker’s run of period horror defined by meticulous craft and historical speech, this time circling werewolf lore. The imprint has already set the date for a holiday release, a promissory note in Eggers as a specialty play that can scale widely if early reception is positive.

Digital platform strategies

Platform tactics for 2026 run on familiar rails. Universal’s genre entries flow to copyright after a cinema-first plus PVOD, a pacing that fortifies both FOMO and sub growth in the back half. Prime Video balances library titles with cross-border buys and brief theater runs when the data justifies it. Max and Hulu accent their strengths in library curation, using in-app campaigns, fright rows, and curated strips to prolong the run on the annual genre haul. Netflix retains agility about internal projects and festival buys, timing horror entries near their drops and framing as events rollouts with surge campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, exploits a paired of limited theatrical footprints and quick platforming that turns chatter to conversion. That will matter for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before using community channels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ continues to evaluate horror on a selective basis. The platform has shown appetite to buy select projects with accomplished filmmakers or A-list packages, then give them a limited theatrical run in partnership with exhibitors to meet qualifying rules or to earn receipts before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney’s domestic pipeline still leverages the 20th Century Studios slate, a key factor for monthly engagement when the genre conversation heats up.

Specialty and indie breakouts

Cineverse is mapping a 2026 lane with two IP plays. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The promise is clear: the same haunting, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a cult classic, modernized for modern soundscapes and visuals. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a fall corridor, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. The distributor has suggested a theatrical rollout for the title, an encouraging sign for fans of the nasty series and for exhibitors hungry for R material in the late stretch.

Focus will play the auteur card with Werwulf, curating the rollout through the fall circuit if the cut is ready, then deploying the Christmas corridor to widen. That positioning has paid off for prestige horror with audience crossover. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not announced many 2026 dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines usually solidify after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A fair assumption is a handful of late-summer and fall platformers that can scale if reception drives. Plan on an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that bows at Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work in tandem, using precision theatrical to prime evangelism that fuels their user base.

Series vs standalone

By proportion, 2026 favors the legacy column. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all tap name recognition. The risk, as ever, is brand erosion. The workable fix is to pitch each entry as a new angle. Paramount is spotlighting character and heritage in Scream 7, Sony is suggesting a from-scratch reboot for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is maximizing a Francophone tone from a buzzed-about director. Those choices count when the audience has so many options and social sentiment changes rapidly.

Non-franchise titles and director-first projects keep oxygen in the system. Jordan Peele’s October film will be sold as a brand unto itself. Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, casts Rachel McAdams in a crash-survival premise with Raimi’s signature playful menace. SOULM8TE offers a clear, chilling tech hook. Werwulf anchors in period detail and an severe tone. Even when the title is not based on existing IP, the assembly is familiar enough to convert curiosity into pre-sales and Thursday-night turnout.

Rolling three-year comps outline the playbook. In 2023, a theater-first model that maintained windows did not stop a day-date move from winning when the brand was strong. In 2024, director-craft horror outperformed in premium formats. In 2025, a return of a beloved infection saga proved again that global horror franchises can still feel fresh when they pivot 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 paired-chapter approach, with chapters lensed sequentially, gives leeway to marketing to bridge entries through relationships and themes and to keep assets in-market without hiatuses.

Production craft signals

The filmmaking conversations behind the year’s horror telegraph a continued preference for tactile, place-driven craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not resemble any recent iteration of the property, a stance that reinforces the practical-first approach he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film closed principal and is lined up for its April 17, 2026 date. Promo should that highlights atmosphere and fear rather than VFX blitz, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership enabling cost management.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has talked about Werwulf as the most shadowed project he has tackled, which tracks with a Middle Ages setting and period-accurate language, a combination that can make for textured sound and a cold, elemental mood on the big screen. Focus will likely showcase this aesthetic in feature stories and craft features before rolling out a tease that keeps plot minimal, a move that has worked for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is tuned for practical nastiness, a signature of the series that exports well in red-band trailers and drives shareable reaction videos from early screenings. Scream 7 positions a meta pivot that refocuses on the original lead. Resident Evil will hit or miss on creature work and production design, which fit with expo activations and curated leaks. Insidious tends to be a sound design showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the auditorium case feel must-have. Look for trailers that spotlight pinpoint sound design, deep-bass stingers, and quiet voids that land in premium houses.

Release calendar overview

January is crowded. 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 foggy reset amid larger brand plays. The month caps with Send Help on January 30 via 20th Century Studios, a survival-and-paranoia piece from Sam Raimi that puts a star forward in Rachel McAdams. The competition here is formidable, but the range of tones creates a lane for each, and the five-week structure offers clean runway for each if word of mouth stays strong.

Late winter and spring prepare summer. Paramount’s Scream 7 lands February 27 with nostalgia heat. In April, New Line’s The Mummy re-centers a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once played to genre counterprogramming and now hosts big openers. The untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 leads into summer while maintaining horror’s hold on early May weekends that are not claimed by superheroes or family tentpoles.

Summer sharpens the contrast. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is lighter-toned and broader, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 serves severe intensity. The counterprogramming logic is solid. The spoof can thrive next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest caters to older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have rolled through premiums.

Shoulder season into fall leans franchise. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives the studio a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously thrived. Resident Evil rolls in after September 18, a transitional slot that still preps for Halloween marketing beats. Jordan Peele’s untitled film books October 23 and will command cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely driven by a slow-reveal plan and limited teasers that center concept over reveals.

Year-end prestige and specialty. Werwulf on December 25 is a signal that genre can work in holiday corridor when packaged as filmmaker-driven prestige horror. The distributor has done this before, platforming with care, then activating critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to hold in chatter into January. If the film earns with critics, the studio can scale in the first week of 2027 while turning holiday audiences and holiday 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 on a rolling basis as production pushes forward. Logline: Sidney returns to confront a new Ghostface while the narrative revisits the original film’s core. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: legacy-forward with modern snap.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A widowed man’s intelligent companion turns into something deadly romantic. Rating: TBA. Production: Shoot completed for an early-year bow. Positioning: techno-horror with feeling.

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 scales the story beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult coalesces in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Filmed consecutively 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. have a peek at this web-site Logline: A man goes back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to be swallowed by a mutable reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Locked and U.S. theatrical booked. Positioning: mood-led 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 prickly boss scramble to survive on a uninhabited island as the chain of command tilts and suspicion grows. Rating: TBA. Production: Shoot complete. 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 vision that returns the monster to horror, rooted in Cronin’s practical craft and rising dread. Rating: TBA. Production: In the can. Positioning: classic creature relaunch with signature touch.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A household haunting setup that threads the dread through a little one’s volatile personal vantage. Rating: to be announced. Production: locked. Positioning: studio-crafted and headline-actor led supernatural mood piece.

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 lampoons present-day genre chatter and true crime preoccupations. Rating: undetermined. Production: shoot planned for fall 2025. Positioning: wide-appeal summer alternative.

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 worldly twist in tone and setting. Rating: TBD. Production: lensing in New Zealand. Positioning: intense red-band chapter tailored to PLF.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: TBD per campaign. Top cast: TBA. Logline: The Further extends again, with a different family caught in residual nightmares. Rating: TBA. Production: set for summer production targeting late-summer opening. Positioning: trusted supernatural label in a supportive window.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: to be disclosed. Top cast: TBA. Logline: A ground-up reset designed to re-engineer the franchise from the ground up, with an center of gravity in survival-core horror over action-heavy spectacle. Rating: to be announced. Production: dev phase with date secured. Positioning: fidelity-minded reboot with crossover prospects.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: awaiting confirmation. Logline: deliberately concealed. Rating: not yet rated. Production: active. Positioning: filmmaker event, teaser-driven.

Werwulf (Focus Features, December 25, 2026)
Director: Robert Eggers. Top cast: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, with other regulars expected. Logline: A medieval werewolf story built on historical diction and bone-deep menace. Rating: to be announced. Production: in preproduction for holiday debut. Positioning: prestige horror for the holidays, with potential awards-season craft appeal.

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 variable, fall window probable.

Why 2026 lands now

Three pragmatic forces structure this lineup. First, production that paused or shifted in 2024 needed spacing on the calendar. Horror can patch those gaps promptly because scripts often call for fewer locales, fewer large-scale CGI sequences, and shorter 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 beaten straight-to-streaming drops. Third, social chatter converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will capitalize on social-ready stingers from test screenings, managed scare clips synced to Thursday previews, and experiential pop-ups that double as influencer content. It is a repeatable playbook because it wins.

Factor four is the scheduling calculus. Early corridors for family and capes are leaner in 2026, opening usable real estate for genre entries that can own a weekend outright or sit as the slightly older-skewing alternative. January is the prime example. Four horror lanes will compete across five weekends, which lets each title generate conversation without cannibalizing the others. Summer provides the other window. The spoof can ride the first-half wave of animated and action tentpoles, then the hard-R entry can make hay in a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Budgets and certifications, sleeper calculus

Budgets remain in the strike zone. Most of the films above will track under the $40–$50 million range, with many far below. That allows for wide PLF deployment without needing superhero-level volume to break even. The most likely R ratings include Evil Dead Burn, Werwulf, and possibly Resident Evil depending on the final cut. Scream 7, Insidious, and SOULM8TE can plausibly land PG-13 to maximize reach, though each franchise has toggled between ratings in the past. Specialty plays tend to lean R to preserve tone and intensity.

The sleeper-hit hunt continues in Q1, where 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 exploit those windows. January could easily deliver the first left-field winner 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.

Audience rhythm across the year

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers momentum and variety. January is a smorgasbord, February delivers a legacy slasher, April returns a Universal monster, May and June provide a two-hit supernatural combo 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 icy, literate nightmare. That is how you sustain conversation and attendance without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can escalate across the year, using earlier releases to prep the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors value the spacing. Horror delivers Thursday preview surges, smart allocations, and strong PLF uptake when the creative supports it. The 2026 slate has at least three titles that can earn PLF placement, with The Mummy, Evil Dead Burn, and Werwulf all showcasing grain, soundscape, 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.

A Promising 2026

Timing shifts. Ratings change. Casts adjust. But the spine of 2026 horror is firm. There is brand gravity where needed, original vision where it matters, and a calendar that shows studios grasp the timing of scares. The awards and festival pipeline into 2027 will come into focus once the fall festivals lock, and it would not be surprising to see at least one late-stage specialty acquisition join the party. For now, the job is simple, shape lean trailers, keep the curtain closed, and let the screams sell the seats.