Antediluvian Evil Stirs in Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed, a pulse pounding horror thriller, rolling out October 2025 across top digital platforms

One eerie supernatural thriller from dramatist / auteur Andrew Chiaramonte, evoking an forgotten dread when newcomers become proxies in a supernatural ordeal. Launching on October 2, 2025, on Prime Video, YouTube, Google Play Movies & TV, iTunes Movies, Apple TV Plus, and Fandango streaming.

Hollywood, CA (August 8, 2025) – get set for *Young & Cursed*, a harrowing episode of overcoming and age-old darkness that will redefine scare flicks this cool-weather season. Helmed by rising creative mind Andrew Chiaramonte, this gritty and gothic thriller follows five figures who suddenly rise stuck in a secluded hideaway under the aggressive will of Kyra, a mysterious girl inhabited by a 2,000-year-old Old Testament spirit. Steel yourself to be gripped by a big screen experience that unites instinctive fear with folklore, dropping on Prime Video, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on the second of October, 2025.


Cursed embodiment has been a recurring concept in cinema. In *Young & Cursed*, that belief is inverted when the demons no longer appear from external sources, but rather internally. This symbolizes the most sinister element of these individuals. The result is a enthralling spiritual tug-of-war where the suspense becomes a ongoing conflict between innocence and sin.


In a forsaken forest, five campers find themselves isolated under the dark presence and spiritual invasion of a unidentified being. As the cast becomes unresisting to resist her dominion, exiled and preyed upon by beings ungraspable, they are confronted to acknowledge their raw vulnerabilities while the timeline without pity strikes toward their dark fate.


In *Young & Cursed*, suspicion surges and links fracture, pushing each member to rethink their identity and the foundation of personal agency itself. The hazard surge with every short lapse, delivering a cinematic nightmare that connects unearthly horror with mental instability.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my vision was to channel ancestral fear, an force born of forgotten ages, manipulating human fragility, and highlighting a spirit that strips down our being when we lose control.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Embodying Kyra demanded embodying something unfamiliar to reason. She is clueless until the demon emerges, and that shift is eerie because it is so raw.”

Release & Availability

*Young & Cursed* will be released for worldwide release beginning from October 2, 2025, on Amazon’s platform, YouTube, Google’s store, iTunes, Apple’s streaming platform, and Fandango at Home—allowing customers around the globe can face this paranormal experience.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just rolled out a new official preview for *Young & Cursed*, debuted to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a sequel to its initial teaser, which has attracted over notable views.


In addition to its domestic release, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has publicized that *Young & Cursed* will also be shared across borders, exporting the fear to fans of fear everywhere.


Make sure to see this gripping ride through nightmares. Watch *Young & Cursed* this All Hallows’ kickoff to experience these fearful discoveries about the psyche.


For cast commentary, extra content, and promotions from behind the lens, follow @YoungAndCursedMovie across Facebook and TikTok and visit the movie’s homepage.





The horror genre’s watershed moment: calendar year 2025 U.S. lineup weaves primeval-possession lore, indie terrors, together with brand-name tremors

Across fight-to-live nightmare stories inspired by near-Eastern lore as well as legacy revivals together with acutely observed indies, 2025 is tracking to be the most dimensioned plus tactically planned year in a decade.

The 2025 horror calendar is more than crowded, it is calculated. the big studios plant stakes across the year using marquee IP, as premium streamers prime the fall with fresh voices and ancestral chills. At the same time, the micro-to-mid budget ranks is catching the kinetic energy from an unprecedented 2024 fest surge. As Halloween remains the genre’s crown jewel, the other windows are mapped with care. The September, October gauntlet has become standard, however this time, players are marking January, spring, and mid-summer. Horror fans are craving, studios are precise, therefore 2025 might go down as horror’s most intentional year yet.

Studio Roadmap and Mini-Major Pulse: The Return of Prestige Fear

Studios are not on the sidelines. If 2024 reset the chessboard, 2025 deepens the push.

Universal’s distribution arm leads off the quarter with a big gambit: a reinterpreted Wolf Man, not returning to the Gothic European hamlet, in a clear present-tense world. Steered by Leigh Whannell and starring Christopher Abbott with Julia Garner, this cut welds lycanthropy to home turmoil. The curse reads as bodily and relational, about spouses, parents, and people. arriving mid January, it fits the new plan to claim winter’s soft window with prestige horror rather than castoffs.

Spring sees the arrival of Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher page-to-screen distilled into spare horror. Steered by Eli Craig with Katie Douglas and Kevin Durand, it functions as blood smeared American gothic with snark. Under the makeup, it dissects provincial panic, age gap tensions, and mob verdicts. Festival whispers say it is sharp.

As summer wanes, Warner’s slate sets loose the finale from its cornerstone horror IP: The Conjuring: Last Rites. The Warrens return, played by Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson, the film signals catharsis as it engages a widely cited real case. Although the framework is familiar, Michael Chaves appears to favor a elegiac, inward tone here. It sits in early September, securing daylight before October saturation.

Following that is The Black Phone 2. From early summer to October, a strong signal. Derrickson re engages, and so do the signature elements that made the first installment a sleeper hit: old school creep, trauma in the foreground, plus uncanny supernatural grammar. This time, the stakes are raised, with more excavation of the “grabber” canon and family hauntings.

Rounding the tentpole corner is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a film that does not need traditional marketing to sell tickets. The second outing goes deeper into backstory, builds out the animatronic fear crew, bridging teens and legacy players. It posts in December, buttoning the final window.

Platform Plays: Slim budgets, major punch

While theaters bet on familiarity, streamers are pushing into risk, and dividends follow.

One standout ambitious title is Weapons, a forensic chill anthology lacing three time frames tied to a mass vanishing. Under Zach Cregger including Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, the piece merges terror with dramatic mass. Hitting theaters late summer with fall digital, 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 work maps love envy and self hatred onto bodily unraveling. It reads tender, repulsive, and intensely uneasy, a three act churn into codependent hell. Before a platform date is locked, it is virtually assured for fall.

In the mix sits Sinners, a 1930s rooted vampire folk legend anchored by Michael B. Jordan. Imaged in sepia bloom and biblical metaphor, it suggests There Will Be Blood blended with Let the Right One In. The project looks at American religious trauma under a supernatural allegory. Early test screenings have marked it as one of the year’s most talked about streaming debuts.

Extra indies bide their time on platforms: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper all work grief and disappearance and identity, choosing meaning over noise.

Possession From Within: Young & Cursed

Posting October 2 across the big platforms, Young & Cursed emerges as a rare mix, tight in frame and epic in resonance. Conceived and directed 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. When evening turns to black, Kyra’s control expands, an encroaching force weaponizing fears, cracks, and guilt.

The threat is psychological first, wired with primal myth. Instead of another exorcism piece centered on Catholic rites or Latin incantations, this one burrows toward something older, something darker. Lilith does not answer ceremony, she climbs through trauma, hush, and human fracture. That possession comes from within, not without, flips the trope and aligns Young & Cursed with a growing trend in horror, intimate character studies that dress themselves in the skin of 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 looks like sharp programming. No overinflated mythology. No canon weight. Just pure psychological dread, contained, tense, and tailor made for the binge and breathe rhythm of digital horror fans. In a year crowded with spectacle, Young & Cursed may stand out by going quiet, then screaming.

From Festivals to Market

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF still seed what horror becomes in six to twelve months. They serve less as display cases, more as runways.

This year’s Fantastic Fest has already confirmed a strong horror lineup. Primate, a tropical body horror curtain raiser, invites Cronenberg Herzog comp. Whistle, a revenge folktale steeped in Aztec myth, is tapped to close with fire.

Midnight slots like If I Had Legs I’d Kick You earn noise for execution beyond quirky names. Backed by A24, it skewers toxic fandom amid a convention lockdown, poised to break big.

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

Festival playbooks now prize branding as much as discovery. Festival laurels are opening moves, not closing notes.

Legacy Horror: Returns, Restarts, and Fresh Angles

Legacy IP arrives sturdier and more intentional this cycle.

Fear Street: Prom Queen comes in July with franchise revival, new lead, retro styling. Breaking with earlier shading, it leans camp and prom night melodrama. Bring tiaras, red dye, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 drops late June, geared to push its techno horror story world with added characters and AI made scares. The original’s social and streaming breakout emboldened Universal to double down.

Another headline is The Long Walk, adapting a grim early Stephen King piece, Directed by Francis Lawrence, it operates as a bleak dystopian tale masked as survival horror, a walk off to death for kids. With a precise angle, it could mirror The Hunger Games for adults in horror.

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

What to Watch

Myth turns mainstream
Lilith in Young & Cursed and Aztec curses in Whistle point to ancient texts and symbols. This is not nostalgia, it is a reclamation of pre Christian archetypes. Horror is not just scaring us, it is reminding us that evil is older than we are.

Body horror swings back
Titles such as Together, Weapons, and Keeper return focus to the flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation now read as metaphors for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

SVOD originals harden up
Throwaway platform horror is on the way out. Platforms show up with budgets for scripts, directors, and campaigns. Debuts like Weapons and Sinners carry event framing, not content bins.

Festival momentum becomes leverage
Badges are functional, they buy theatrical access, prime placement, and cycles. Skip festival strategy in 2025 and the film risks invisibility.

The big screen is a trust exercise
Studios save theaters for outperform prospects or IP farmers. Everything else is PVOD or hybrid. Horror continues in theaters, in narrower curated lanes.

Near Term Outlook: Fall crush plus winter X factor

With Young & Cursed, The Conjuring: Last Rites, The Black Phone 2, and Weapons all stacked across September and October, the fall is downright saturated. Indies like Bone Lake and Keeper will have to fight for oxygen. Keep an eye on possible slips into early 2026 or platform flips.

With Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 in December, a stealth streamer drop might pop near year end. Since big films lean mythic, a final monster or exorcism play can claim space.

The genre’s success in 2025 will hinge not on any one title, but on how well its diverse slate reaches its scattered, increasingly segmented audience. The aim is not another Get Out chase, it is durable horror beyond gross.



The oncoming terror year to come: brand plays, standalone ideas, in tandem with A jammed Calendar calibrated for screams

Dek: The incoming horror season crams early with a January bottleneck, before it runs through the summer months, and running into the holiday frame, balancing brand heft, new concepts, and well-timed release strategy. Studios and platforms are betting on right-sized spends, theater-first strategies, and platform-native promos that pivot these offerings into culture-wide discussion.

How the genre looks for 2026

This space has emerged as the steady swing in release strategies, a corner that can accelerate when it connects and still limit the losses when it falls short. After the 2023 year demonstrated to studio brass that disciplined-budget fright engines can own mainstream conversation, the following year maintained heat with high-profile filmmaker pieces and sleeper breakouts. The trend moved into the 2025 frame, where returns and prestige plays confirmed there is space for many shades, from brand follow-ups to fresh IP that resonate abroad. The aggregate for the 2026 slate is a slate that is strikingly coherent across companies, with purposeful groupings, a equilibrium of brand names and new concepts, and a reinvigorated stance on big-screen windows that fuel later windows on premium home window and digital services.

Planners observe the category now behaves like a fill-in ace on the rollout map. Horror can bow on virtually any date, deliver a simple premise for trailers and UGC-friendly snippets, and outstrip with patrons that show up on early shows and hold through the second weekend if the offering hits. Following a production delay era, the 2026 pattern indicates conviction in that equation. The year commences with a thick January band, then targets spring into early summer for audience offsets, while holding room for a fall run that extends to the fright window and afterwards. The gridline also spotlights the continuing integration of arthouse labels and subscription services that can platform a title, grow buzz, and broaden at the precise moment.

A reinforcing pattern is legacy care across shared universes and veteran brands. Distribution groups are not just turning out another continuation. They are moving to present connection with a sense of event, whether that is a brandmark that broadcasts a fresh attitude or a casting move that anchors a next film to a vintage era. At the simultaneously, the helmers behind the headline-grabbing originals are doubling down on on-set craft, physical gags and concrete locations. That interplay gives the 2026 slate a confident blend of assurance and newness, which is how the films export.

Major-player strategies for 2026

Paramount plants an early flag with two big-ticket releases that bracket the tone map. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with Kevin Williamson in the lead and Neve Campbell back at the center, setting it up as both a passing of the torch and a return-to-roots character piece. Filming is in progress in Atlanta, and the artistic posture points to a throwback-friendly strategy without going over the last two entries’ family thread. The studio is likely to mount a drive fueled by legacy iconography, early character teases, and a tiered teaser plan targeting late fall. Distribution is theatrical through 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 contributors for the first time since the early 2000s, a campaign lever the campaign will spotlight. As a summer relief option, this one will hunt wide buzz through meme-friendly cuts, with the horror spoof format supporting quick switches to whatever drives the meme cycle that spring.

Universal has three specific strategies. SOULM8TE premieres January 9, 2026, a connected offshoot from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The core idea is efficient, somber, and commercial: a grieving man installs an digital partner that becomes a murderous partner. The date nudges it to the front of a thick month, with Universal’s marketing likely to recreate eerie street stunts and bite-size content that blurs intimacy and terror.

On May 8, 2026, the studio places an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely interpreted as the feature developed under placeholder labels in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The official listing currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which leaves room for a public title to become an headline beat closer to the initial promo. The timing secures a slot in early May while larger tentpoles stack elsewhere.

Anchoring the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film plants on October 23, 2026, a slot he has dominated before. His entries are branded as director events, with a minimalist tease and a second wave of trailers that signal tone without plot the concept. The Halloween runway gives the studio room to command 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, joins with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček leads, with Souheila Yacoub leading. The franchise has proven that a blood-soaked, practical-effects forward mix can feel prestige on a lean spend. Frame it as a blood-soaked summer horror jolt that centers Check This Out global rollout, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most world markets.

Sony’s horror bench is unusually deep. The studio books two marquee IP entries in the back half. An untitled Insidious film arrives August 21, 2026, preserving a bankable supernatural brand active while the spin-off branch continues to develop. Sony has adjusted timing on this title before, but the current plan locks it in late summer, where the brand has found success.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil reappears in what Sony is selling as a reimagined 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 charge to serve both franchise faithful and first-timers. The fall slot provides the studio time to build promo materials around environmental design, and creature work, elements that can accelerate PLF interest and fan events.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, places a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film advances Eggers’ run of period horror grounded in historical precision and period language, this time steeped in lycan lore. The imprint has already locked the day for a holiday release, a strong signal in Eggers as a specialty play that can scale widely if early reception is glowing.

Where the platforms fit in

Platform tactics for 2026 run on established tracks. Universal titles head to copyright after a theatrical and PVOD run, a ordering that maximizes both launch urgency and trial spikes in the later phase. Prime Video stitches together licensed films with global acquisitions and qualifying theatrical engagements when the data justifies it. Max and Hulu lean on their strengths in catalog engagement, using featured rows, holiday hubs, and editorial rows to increase tail value on the year’s genre earnings. Netflix keeps options open about Netflix films and festival grabs, scheduling horror entries on shorter runways and turning into events rollouts with surge campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, operates a hybrid of focused cinema runs and rapid platforming that funnels enthusiasm into trials. That will be key for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before turning to genre-fan funnels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ adopts case-by-case posture for horror on a per-project basis. The platform has been willing to acquire select projects with recognized filmmakers or star-led packages, then give them a boutique theatrical in partnership with exhibitors to meet guild rules or to gather buzz before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney’s domestic pipeline still capitalizes on the 20th Century Studios slate, a notable driver for subscriber stickiness when the genre conversation spikes.

Indie and specialty outlook

Cineverse is structuring a 2026 slate with two recognizable titles. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The proposition is straightforward: the same brooding, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a cult item, recalibrated for modern audio and picture. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a fall frame, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. Cineverse has announced a theatrical-first plan for Legacy, an healthy marker for fans of the brutal series and for exhibitors wanting edgy counter in the autumn stretch.

Focus will push the auteur angle with Werwulf, managing the title through the autumn circuit if the cut is ready, then relying on the holiday frame to widen. That positioning has worked well for filmmaker-first horror with mainstream crossovers. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not firmed many 2026 dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines tend to converge after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A solid projection is a sprinkle of late-summer and fall platformers that can expand if reception drives. Be ready for an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that plays Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work together, using precision theatrical to fuel evangelism that fuels their membership.

IP versus fresh ideas

By volume, 2026 tips toward the legacy column. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all leverage fan equity. The caveat, as ever, is staleness. The practical approach is to brand each entry as a recalibration. Paramount is bringing forward character and lineage in Scream 7, Sony is promising a full reset for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is pushing a French-flavored turn from a rising filmmaker. Those choices carry weight when the audience has so many options and social sentiment swings fast.

Non-franchise titles and director-driven titles keep the lungs full. Jordan Peele’s October film will be pitched as a brand unto itself. Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, centers Rachel McAdams in a crash-survival premise with that teasing menace. SOULM8TE offers a sharp, spooky tech hook. Werwulf brings period specificity and an uncompromising tone. Even when the title is not based on a brand, the team and cast is comforting enough to translate curiosity into advance sales and preview-night crowds.

The last three-year set make sense of the approach. In 2023, a theatrical-first model that held distribution windows did not stop a parallel release from succeeding when the brand was robust. In 2024, filmmaker-craft-led horror rose in PLF auditoriums. In 2025, a rebirth of a beloved infection saga reminded the market that global horror franchises can still feel novel when they alter lens and raise the stakes. That last point is directly relevant to Sony’s 28 Years Later plan, which extends January 16, 2026 with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, this time directed by Nia DaCosta from a script by Alex Garland. The double feature plan, with chapters filmed consecutively, lets marketing to cross-link entries through character web and themes and to keep materials circulating without extended gaps.

Production craft signals

The director conversations behind this slate indicate a continued lean toward practical, location-rooted craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not track with any recent iteration of the property, a stance that squares with the practical-craft ethos he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film wrapped photography and is moving toward its April 17, 2026 date. Expect a campaign that elevates texture and dread rather than whiz-bang spectacle, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership supporting tight cost control.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has described Werwulf as the most forbidding project he has tackled, which tracks with a 13th-century milieu and period-accurate language, a combination that can make for sonic immersion and a austere, elemental atmosphere on the big screen. Focus will likely pre-sell this aesthetic in craft journalism and craft spotlights before rolling out a mood teaser that prioritizes vibe over plot, a move that has performed for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is calibrated for visceral gnarl, a signature of the series that sells overseas in red-band trailers and spurs shareable scream clips from early screenings. Scream 7 hints at a meta recalibration that returns to the core star. Resident Evil will rise or fall on monster realization and design, which work nicely for convention floor stunts and guarded reveals. Insidious tends to be a audio showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the premium-screen pitch feel primary. Look for trailers that underscore fine-grain sound, deep-bass stingers, and quiet voids that land in premium houses.

Calendar cadence

January is full. 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 marquee brands. The month buttons 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 credible, but the range of tones lets each find a lane, and the five-week structure permits a clean run for each if word of mouth sustains.

Post-January through spring load in summer. Scream 7 debuts February 27 with brand energy. In April, New Line’s The Mummy reintroduces a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once played to genre counterprogramming and now supports 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 spreads the field. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is comedic and broad, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 serves ferocious intensity. The counterprogramming logic is sound. The spoof can connect next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest delights older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have moved through premium slots.

Back half into fall leans recognizable. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives the studio a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously done well. Resident Evil lines up after September 18, a bridge slot that still feeds into Halloween marketing beats. The Peele event claims October 23 and will seize cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely reinforced by a mystery-driven teaser strategy and limited plot reveals that put concept first.

Prestige-horror at year-end. Werwulf on December 25 is a position that genre can hold in the holidays when packaged as awards-flirting horror. Focus has done this before, measured platforming, then turning to critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to keep the film in the conversation into January. If the film clicks critically, the studio can expand in the first week of 2027 while building on holiday impulse and gift-card spend.

Title briefs within the narrative

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting TBA in phases as production rolls. Logline: Sidney returns to re-engage a new Ghostface while the narrative rethreads the original film’s founding notes. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: roots reset with a contemporary edge.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A grieving man’s algorithmic partner shifts 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 expands the scope beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult forms in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Double-shot with the first film. Positioning: revived prestige horror saga’s second leg.

Return to Silent Hill (Cineverse, January 23, 2026)
Director: Christophe Gans. Top cast: TBA in updated campaign materials. Logline: A man comes back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to encounter a unstable reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Complete with theatrical path. 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 abrasive boss fight to survive on a remote island as the power dynamic upends and dread encroaches. Rating: TBA. Production: Finished. Positioning: star-centered survival shocker from a maestro.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles kept quiet in official materials. Logline: A renewed take that returns the monster to fear, grounded in Cronin’s tactile craft and suffocating dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Principal 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 in-home haunting chiller that plays with the chill of a child’s shaky interpretations. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: wrapped. 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 returning creatively. Logline: {A satire sequel that satirizes modern genre fads and true-crime manias. Rating: undetermined. Production: production booked for fall 2025. Positioning: mass-audience summer option.

Evil Dead Burn (Warner Bros. domestic, July 24, 2026)
Director: Sébastien Vaniček. Top cast: Souheila Yacoub, with ensemble additions. Logline: A new infestation of Deadites erupts, with an global twist in tone and setting. Rating: TBD. Production: on location in New Zealand. Positioning: ferocious R chapter primed for premium screens.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: TBA in marketing materials. Top cast: TBA. Logline: The Further unfurls again, with a new household snared by residual nightmares. Rating: pending. Production: slated for summer production leading to late-summer release. Positioning: consistent franchise performer in a beneficial frame.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: awaiting public disclosure. Top cast: pending. Logline: A re-seeded launch designed to recalibrate the franchise from the ground up, with an center of gravity in classic survival-horror tone over action spectacle. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: moving through development on a locked slot. Positioning: game-faithful modern reboot with crossover potential.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: to be announced. Logline: strategically hidden. Rating: TBA. Production: underway. Positioning: filmmaker-led event with teaser rollout.

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 primordial menace. Rating: pending. Production: prepping toward a December 25 launch. 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 theatrical-first route ahead of platforming. Status: date variable, fall window probable.

Why this year, why now

Three workable forces drive this lineup. First, production that bottlenecked or re-sequenced in 2024 called for breathing room in the schedule. Horror can slot in fast because scripts often are location-light, fewer large-scale effects set pieces, and compressed 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 outperformed straight-to-streaming placements. Third, social buzz converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will mine bite-size scare clips from test screenings, select scare clips paired with Thursday night previews, and experiential pop-ups that become influencer fuel. It is a repeatable playbook because it wins.

The slot calculus is real. Early corridors for family and capes are leaner in 2026, clearing runway for genre entries that can dominate a weekend or play as the older-leaning alternative. January is the prime example. Four distinct flavors of horror will compete across five weekends, which allows chatter to build title by title. Summer provides the other window. The parody aligns with early family and action waves, then the hard-R entry can exploit a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Economics and ratings, plus sleeper strategy

Budgets remain in the sweet spot. Most of the films above will stay under the $40 to $50 million threshold, 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 search for sleepers continues in Q1, where disciplined-budget genre can own weekends with minimal competition, and again in late summer, where horror often becomes the conversation when tentpoles tire. The 2026 slate is set up to harvest those lanes. January could easily deliver the first quiet breakout of the year, and August into September gives Sony an avenue to hold screens with back-to-back supernatural IP while still leaving room for an indie breakout.

Internationally, brand recognition helps Resident Evil, Evil Dead, and Scream travel, while 28 Years Later benefits from a British setting and returning talent. Werwulf and The Mummy will lean on auteur and classic-monster awareness abroad. Streamers will amplify the tail, with copyright pickups boosting Universal’s slate and Shudder driving evangelism for Cineverse titles. Project a sturdy PVOD period across titles, since horror fans have shown a willingness to pay for convenience after an opening weekend, especially when word of mouth is strong.

Audience rhythm across the year

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers rhythm and variety. January is a spread, February delivers a legacy slasher, April reanimates a Universal monster, May and June provide a ghostly double-hit for date nights and group outings, July runs hard, August and September keep the supernatural momentum, October turns into a Jordan Peele event, and December invites a cold, literate nightmare. That is how you hold talk and turnout without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can stack through the year, using earlier releases to set up the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors favor the spacing. Horror delivers consistent Thursday swells, 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, sonics, and visuals that benefit from larger formats. The calendar also leaves room for specialty platformers to open in New York and Los Angeles, build reviews, and slide into national conversation as the fall progresses.

2026 Is Well Positioned

Timing shifts. Ratings change. Casts evolve. But the spine of 2026 horror is established. There is brand gravity where needed, distinct vision where it matters, 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 eleventh-hour specialty buy join the party. For now, the job is simple, craft precise trailers, keep secrets, and let the scares sell the seats.