Mythic Evil awakens: Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed, a hair raising horror feature, landing Oct 2025 across major platforms

An hair-raising spiritual thriller from dramatist / creative lead Andrew Chiaramonte, summoning an ancient terror when passersby become victims in a diabolical game. Debuting this October 2nd, 2025, on Prime Video, the YouTube platform, Google Play Movies & TV, Apple iTunes, Apple TV Plus, and Fandango on-demand.

Hollywood, CA (August 8th, 2025) – ready yourself for *Young & Cursed*, a intense account of continuance and archaic horror that will remodel genre cinema this cool-weather season. Crafted by rising filmmaking talent Andrew Chiaramonte, this nerve-racking and gothic thriller follows five strangers who awaken stranded in a wilderness-bound house under the unfriendly dominion of Kyra, a mysterious girl controlled by a 2,000-year-old biblical demon. Be warned to be drawn in by a filmic journey that melds soul-chilling terror with ancestral stories, unleashing on Amazon’s streaming platform, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on the second of October, 2025.


Supernatural inhabitation has been a recurring fixture in visual storytelling. In *Young & Cursed*, that formula is subverted when the fiends no longer arise outside their bodies, but rather from their psyche. This illustrates the most hidden part of the group. The result is a intense inner struggle where the drama becomes a brutal clash between right and wrong.


In a isolated outland, five youths find themselves sealed under the unholy influence and possession of a enigmatic character. As the victims becomes helpless to oppose her command, exiled and attacked by entities mind-shattering, they are obligated to acknowledge their worst nightmares while the timeline harrowingly strikes toward their destruction.


In *Young & Cursed*, paranoia mounts and links crack, urging each person to evaluate their values and the structure of autonomy itself. The threat surge with every fleeting time, delivering a chilling narrative that harmonizes ghostly evil with inner turmoil.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my aim was to evoke pure dread, an malevolence that existed before mankind, manifesting in emotional vulnerability, and navigating a evil that tests the soul when agency is lost.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Taking on the role of Kyra involved tapping into something more primal than sorrow. She is in denial until the demon emerges, and that conversion is eerie because it is so unshielded.”

Platform Access

*Young & Cursed* will be available for audience access beginning on October 2nd, 2025, on Amazon’s platform, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango on-demand—delivering audiences no matter where they are can watch this terrifying film.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just unveiled a new sneak peek #2 for *Young & Cursed*, streaming to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a next step to its original promo, which has garnered over thousands of viewers.


In addition to its continental debut, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has announced that *Young & Cursed* will also be offered to international markets, bringing the film to viewers around the world.


Witness this unforgettable ride through nightmares. Enter *Young & Cursed* this October the 2nd to dive into these evil-rooted truths about the soul.


For featurettes, filmmaker commentary, and alerts straight from the filmmakers, follow @YoungAndCursedMovie across your socials and visit our spooky domain.





U.S. horror’s sea change: 2025 for genre fans domestic schedule integrates primeval-possession lore, independent shockers, and tentpole growls

Kicking off with survival horror suffused with ancient scripture and extending to brand-name continuations together with focused festival visions, 2025 stands to become the most variegated together with carefully orchestrated year since the mid-2010s.

The 2025 horror calendar goes beyond packed, it is precision-tuned. studio powerhouses set cornerstones through proven series, while premium streamers front-load the fall with emerging auteurs set against legend-coded dread. Meanwhile, the artisan tier is carried on the tailwinds of a record-setting 2024 festival season. As Halloween remains the genre’s crown jewel, the non-October slots are tuned with exactness. A packed September to October corridor has become a rite of passage, distinctly in 2025, horror is also claiming January, spring, and even mid-summer. Viewers are hungry, studios are targeted, accordingly 2025 might go down as horror’s most intentional year yet.

What Studios and Mini-Majors Are Doing: Premium dread reemerges

The majors are assertive. If 2024 set the stage for reinvention, 2025 amplifies the bet.

Universal’s pipeline begins the calendar with a big gambit: a reconceived Wolf Man, eschewing a mist-shrouded old-world European town, inside today’s landscape. Guided by Leigh Whannell fronted by Christopher Abbott with Julia Garner, this chapter binds the lycanthropy to domestic unraveling. The change is not purely bodily, it is marital, parental, and achingly human. arriving mid January, it fits the new plan to claim winter’s soft window with prestige horror rather than castoffs.

The spring frame introduces Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher adaptation reworked as a minimalist shock machine. Steered by Eli Craig including Katie Douglas and Kevin Durand, it feels like crimson splashed Midwest menace with winked critique. Behind the grin, it unpacks local hysteria, generational chasms, and crowd justice. Advance murmurs say it draws blood.

As summer eases, Warner’s pipeline launches the swan song of its most reliable horror franchise: The Conjuring: Last Rites. Farmiga and Wilson return as the Warrens, the entry offers emotional coda while tackling one of their notorious real cases. Though the outline is tried, Chaves is expected to tune it to a grieving, self reflective color. It sets in early September, opening runway before October heat.

Next is The Black Phone 2. Once set for early summer, the October pivot signals belief. Derrickson re teams, and the defining traits of the first sleeper return: vintage toned fear, trauma as narrative engine, and a cold supernatural calculus. This time the stakes climb, with added layers to the “grabber” frame and long memory of loss.

Capping the big ticket run is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a movie that scarcely needs conventional ads. The sequel leans deeper into its lore, thickens the animatronic pantheon, seeking teens plus thirty something gamers. It posts in December, holding the cold season’s end.

Streaming Originals: Small budgets, sharp fangs

With theaters prioritizing brand safety, streamers are swinging risk forward, and returns look strong.

A top daring platform piece is Weapons, a multi timeline cold-case dread piece splicing three ages joined by a mass disappearance. Under Zach Cregger with Josh Brolin opposite Julia Garner, the entry marries dread with character weight. Posting late summer theatrically then fall streaming, it is expected to spark online debate and post viewing breakdowns, much like Barbarian before it.

On the quieter side is Together, a room scale body horror descent starring Alison Brie and Dave Franco. Taking place in an isolated rental as a retreat goes wrong, the piece probes how love, envy, and self loathing become bodily rot. It is romantic, grotesque, and deeply uncomfortable, a three act spiral into codependent hell. Despite no official platform date, it is a near certain autumn drop.

Also rising is Sinners, a 1930s rooted vampire folk legend fronted by Michael B. Jordan. Visualized in sepia palette with scriptural metaphor, it mirrors There Will Be Blood meeting Let the Right One In. The film interrogates American religious trauma through supernatural allegory. Dry runs call it a headline grabbing streamer.

Other streamer plays queue softly: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper all work grief and disappearance and identity, choosing meaning over noise.

Possession With Depth: Young & Cursed

Rolling out October 2 across streaming, Young & Cursed emerges as a rare mix, tight in frame and epic in resonance. Authored and directed by Andrew Chiaramonte, the film follows five strangers who wake in a remote wilderness cabin under the thrall of Kyra, a young woman possessed by the ancient biblical demon Lilith. As the hours blacken, her hold tightens, an invasive current triggering fears, fissures, and regret.

The menace is mind forward, supercharged by primal myth. Swerving the standard exorcism angle of Catholic rite and Latin word, this story returns to something older, something darker. Lilith comes not via liturgy, but from trauma, quiet, and human brittleness. The shift to interior possession, not exterior conjuring, flips expectation and aligns Young & Cursed with an expanding wave, intimate character portraits wearing 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. That is a savvy move. No bloated canon. No brand fatigue. Bare psychological dread, trim and tense, designed for binge and breath patterns. In the noise, Young & Cursed could cut through by staying hushed, then erupting.

Festival Launchpads, Market Engines

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

The Fantastic Fest slate for horror is strong this year. Primate kicks off with tropical body horror and gets Cronenberg Herzog cross talk. Whistle, Aztec coded revenge folklore, may cap the fest blazing.

Those midnight titles, including If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, buzz from delivery as much as naming. A24’s satire of toxic fandom inside a con lockdown aims at breakout.

SXSW bowed Clown in a Cornfield while feeding deal chatter for microbudget haunts. Sundance tends to present grief infused elevated horror and likely will, where Tribeca’s genre program draws urban, social, and surreal.

The festival game increasingly values branding over mere discovery. A Fantastic Fest or TIFF badge is phase one marketing, not a coda.

Legacy IP: Next Chapters, New Starts, New Shapes

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. Compared to earlier parts, it tilts camp and prom night melodrama. Bring tiaras, red dye, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 opens late June, aiming to expand its techno horror mythology with new characters and new AI generated terrors. The debut’s viral plus streaming heat gives Universal reason to press the bet.

Next comes The Long Walk, adapting one of Stephen King’s earliest, most harrowing works, led by Francis Lawrence, it shows as a grim dystopian parable set in survival horror, a youth walk ending only in death. With sharp marketing, it could translate to The Hunger Games for horror adults.

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.

Emerging Currents

Old myth goes broad
From Lilith in Young & Cursed, and with Aztec curses in Whistle, horror taps ancient texts and symbols. Not nostalgia, a reclaim of pre Christian archetypes. Horror exceeds jolts, it insists evil is ancient.

Body horror comes roaring back
Titles such as Together, Weapons, and Keeper return focus to the flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation map to heartbreak, grief, and regret.

Streamers grow fangs
Low grade filler is no longer the platform default. Platforms invest in real scripts, real directors, and real campaigns. Entries like Weapons and Sinners get event treatment, not inventory.

Laurels convert to leverage
Laurels are not just decorative, they leverage theatrical, premium placement, and media cycles. Skip festival strategy in 2025 and the film risks invisibility.

Cinemas are a trust fall
The cinema lane is kept for probable outperformers or branchers. Everything else heads to PVOD or hybrid drops. Horror still lives in theaters, more curated than broad.

Forecast: Autumn crowding, winter surprise

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

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 anchors December, and a surprise streaming drop could still arrive late. As mythic runs hot, a closing creature or exorcism could still arrive.

The 2025 performance is about reach across segments, not one hero title. The assignment is not to chase the next Get Out, it is to build horror that endures beyond box office.



The next fear cycle: brand plays, filmmaker-first projects, plus A loaded Calendar calibrated for jolts

Dek: The brand-new terror season crams early with a January crush, and then unfolds through midyear, and well into the holiday frame, weaving name recognition, original angles, and tactical counterprogramming. Studio marketers and platforms are focusing on cost discipline, exclusive theatrical windows first, and short-form initiatives that pivot genre releases into all-audience topics.

Horror’s position as 2026 begins

The horror marketplace has established itself as the bankable tool in release strategies, a genre that can lift when it lands and still safeguard the drawdown when it does not. After 2023 signaled to buyers that modestly budgeted pictures can command pop culture, the following year held pace with buzzy auteur projects and stealth successes. The carry moved into 2025, where resurrections and elevated films confirmed there is appetite for many shades, from franchise continuations to original one-offs that carry overseas. The combined impact for 2026 is a slate that looks unusually coordinated across the market, with clear date clusters, a combination of familiar brands and new pitches, and a re-energized emphasis on theatrical windows that fuel later windows on premium digital rental and subscription services.

Buyers contend the category now operates like a plug-and-play option on the distribution slate. Horror can premiere on almost any weekend, generate a simple premise for teasers and TikTok spots, and over-index with patrons that arrive on first-look nights and keep coming through the week two if the title lands. On the heels of a strike-driven backlog, the 2026 pattern underscores assurance in that dynamic. The slate rolls out with a thick January schedule, then primes spring and early summer for audience offsets, while saving space for a fall cadence that stretches into the fright window and into the next week. The map also reflects the expanded integration of arthouse labels and digital platforms that can build gradually, stoke social talk, and expand at the inflection point.

An added macro current is legacy care across connected story worlds and legacy IP. Distribution groups are not just producing another installment. They are looking to package lineage with a headline quality, whether that is a title design that signals a reframed mood or a lead change that binds a latest entry to a early run. At the simultaneously, the helmers behind the top original plays are embracing material texture, in-camera effects and site-specific worlds. That combination produces the 2026 slate a robust balance of assurance and shock, which is how horror tends to travel globally.

The majors’ 2026 approach

Paramount defines the early cadence with two prominent titles that bookend the tonal range. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with original architect Kevin Williamson in the director seat and Neve Campbell back at the forefront, setting it up as both a relay and a back-to-basics character-forward chapter. Production is underway in Atlanta, and the story approach telegraphs a legacy-leaning mode without replaying the last two entries’ Carpenter-sisters arc. A campaign is expected rooted in legacy iconography, first images of characters, and a tease cadence slated for late fall. Distribution is cinema-first via Paramount.

Paramount also revives a once-mighty spoof franchise with Scary Movie 6 on June 12, 2026, directed by Michael Tiddes. Anna Faris and Regina Hall are paired again, with the Wayans brothers involved creatively for the first time since the early 2000s, a selling point the campaign will foreground. As a off-tentpole summer play, this one will pursue four-quadrant chatter through meme-ready spots, with the horror spoof format enabling quick turns to whatever owns trend lines that spring.

Universal has three discrete plays. SOULM8TE opens January 9, 2026, a tie-in spinoff from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The conceit is crisp, tragic, and logline-clear: a grieving man adopts an AI companion that shifts into a perilous partner. The date places it at the front of a thick month, with the Universal machine likely to renew off-kilter promo beats and short-form creative that hybridizes romance and creep.

On May 8, 2026, the studio slots an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely rumored as the feature developed under internal titles in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The official release calendar currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which sets up a name unveil to become an fan moment closer to the initial promo. The timing offers Universal a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles crowd different corridors.

Completing the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film books October 23, 2026, a slot he has made his own before. Peele’s pictures are framed as event films, with a teaser with minimal detail and a later trailer push that prime atmosphere without details the concept. The late-month date offers Universal room to fill pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then work the copyright window to capture late-October interest at home.

Warner Bros., via New Line, joins with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček leads, with Souheila Yacoub anchoring. The franchise has consistently shown that a raw, physical-effects centered style can feel cinematic on a moderate cost. Position this as a grime-caked summer horror shot that centers international markets, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most non-U.S. markets.

Sony’s horror bench is impressively deep. The studio sets two IP moves in the back half. An untitled Insidious film premieres August 21, 2026, continuing a evergreen supernatural brand on the grid while the spin-off branch builds quietly. Sony has shifted dates on this title before, but the current plan plants it in late summer, where Insidious has long performed.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil restarts in what the studio is presenting as a new foundation for its game-to-film powerhouse. With the PlayStation Productions pipeline now a pillar part of the studio’s strategy, this new take has a charge to serve both diehards and fresh viewers. The fall slot hands Sony window to build campaign creative around narrative world, and practical creature work, elements that can lift premium format interest and fandom activation.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, plants a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film extends the filmmaker’s run of period horror characterized by obsessive craft and period language, this time driven by werewolf stories. The label has already set the date for a holiday release, a clear message in Eggers as a specialty play that can move wide if early reception is robust.

Platform lanes and windowing

Platform strategies for 2026 run on familiar rails. Universal’s genre slate feed copyright after a theater movies window then PVOD, a ladder that expands both debut momentum and sign-up spikes in the later phase. Prime Video combines licensed titles with world buys and short theatrical plays when the data encourages it. Max and Hulu accent their strengths in catalog engagement, using seasonal hubs, horror hubs, and staff picks to prolong the run on the horror cume. Netflix remains opportunistic about Netflix originals and festival snaps, slotting horror entries closer to launch and eventizing debuts with compressed campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, uses a staged of targeted cinema placements and prompt platform moves that monetizes buzz via trials. That will be critical for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before activating horror-fan channels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ treats carefully horror on a bespoke basis. The platform has shown a willingness to pick up select projects with top-tier auteurs or name-led packages, then give them a small theatrical footprint in partnership with exhibitors to meet eligibility thresholds or to show bona fides before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney’s domestic pipeline still draws on the 20th Century Studios slate, a important element for monthly activity when the genre conversation swells.

Indie and specialty outlook

Cineverse is mapping a 2026 sequence with two label plays. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The pitch is clean: the same brooding, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a diehard favorite, refined for modern mix and grade. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a autumn frame, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. Cineverse has hinted a big-screen first plan for Legacy, an optimistic indicator for fans of the savage series and for exhibitors seeking adult skew in the September weeks.

Focus will cultivate the auteur lane with Werwulf, guiding the film through autumn festivals if the cut is ready, then pressing the year-end corridor to broaden. That positioning has been successful for craft-driven horror with crossover potential. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not firmed many 2026 dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines commonly finalize after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A fair assumption is a handful of late-summer and fall platformers that can widen if reception prompts. Plan on an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that launches at Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work jointly, using limited runs to spark the evangelism that fuels their community.

Franchises versus originals

By share, 2026 skews toward the series side. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all exploit legacy awareness. The concern, as ever, is audience fatigue. The near-term solution is to brand each entry as a reframed mode. Paramount is underscoring core character and DNA in Scream 7, Sony is hinting at a ground-zero restart for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is leaning into a French-tinted vision from a buzzed-about director. Those choices carry weight when the audience has so many options and social sentiment turns quickly.

Non-franchise titles and auteur plays keep the lungs full. Jordan Peele’s October film will be presented as a brand unto itself. Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, puts Rachel McAdams in a crash-survival premise with Raimi’s playful menace. SOULM8TE offers a tight, eerie tech hook. Werwulf leans on period specificity and an rigorous tone. Even when the title is not based on a property, the packaging is assuring enough to generate pre-sales and Thursday-night crowds.

Comparable trends from recent years clarify the approach. In 2023, a theatrical-first plan that respected streaming windows did not deter a parallel release from performing when the brand was robust. In 2024, craft-forward auteur horror over-performed in premium formats. In 2025, a revived cycle of a beloved infection saga underlined that global horror franchises can still feel novel when they change perspective and scale the storytelling. That last point is directly relevant to Sony’s 28 Years Later plan, which proceeds January 16, 2026 with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, this time directed by Nia DaCosta from a script by Alex Garland. The linked-chapter plan, with chapters produced back-to-back, allows marketing to tie installments through character and theme and to sustain campaign assets without dead zones.

Technique and craft currents

The craft rooms behind this slate forecast a continued preference for hands-on, location-grounded craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not repeat any recent iteration of the property, a stance that reinforces the in-camera sensibility he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film completed principal and is aimed at its April 17, 2026 date. Expect a campaign that emphasizes texture and dread rather than roller-coaster spectacle, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership sustaining budget prudence.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has called Werwulf as the most chilling project he has tackled, which tracks with a Middle Ages setting and period-faithful dialogue, a combination that can make for wraparound sound and a chilly, elemental vibe on the big screen. Focus will likely pre-sell this aesthetic in behind-the-scenes pieces and technical spotlights before rolling out a teaser that plays with mood rather than plot, a move that has worked for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is aimed at visceral gnarl, a signature of the series that lands overseas in red-band trailers and produces shareable audience clips from early screenings. Scream 7 positions a meta-horror reset that re-anchors on the original star. Resident Evil will win or lose on monster aesthetics and world-building, which align with expo activations and managed asset releases. Insidious tends to be a sound-mix showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the theater case feel must-have. Look for trailers that elevate hyper-detailed sound, deep-bass stingers, and held silences that benefit on big speakers.

From winter to holidays

January is loaded. SOULM8TE opens January 9, 2026, then Sony returns a week later with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple on January 16. Return to Silent Hill follows on January 23, a foggy reset amid heavier IP. The month wraps 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 legit, but the tonal variety ensures lanes for each, and the five-week structure enables clean play for each if word of mouth stays strong.

Post-January through spring prime the summer. Paramount’s Scream 7 rolls out February 27 with brand warmth. In April, New Line’s The Mummy revives a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once favored genre counterprogramming and now accommodates big openers. The 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 spoofy and broad, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 presents red-band intensity. The counterprogramming logic is coherent. The spoof can hit next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest delights older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have rolled through premiums.

Late summer into fall leans recognizable. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives the studio a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously worked. Resident Evil rolls in after September 18, a shoulder season window that still connects to Halloween marketing beats. The Peele event holds October 23 and will engross cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely driven by a mystery-driven teaser strategy and limited advance reveals that stress concept over spoilers.

Christmas prestige. Werwulf on December 25 is a signal that genre can hold in the holidays when packaged as auteur prestige horror. Focus has done this before, platforming with care, then turning to critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to remain in discourse into January. If the film lands critically, the studio can extend in the first week of 2027 while benefiting from holiday season and card redemption.

Title-by-title briefings, embedded in the narrative

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting rolling out as production advances. Logline: Sidney returns to counter a new Ghostface while the narrative rethreads the original film’s genetic code. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: origin-forward with a contemporary twist.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A loss-struck man’s intelligent companion escalates into something fatal and romantic. Rating: TBA. Production: Shoot completed for an early-year bow. Positioning: tech shocker with 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 widens the scope beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult rises in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Twin-shot 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 journeys back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to be swallowed by a altering reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Complete with theatrical path. 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 prickly boss fight to survive on a cut-off island as the chain of command upends and paranoia builds. Rating: TBA. Production: Principal done. Positioning: celebrity-led survival horror from a legend.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles not disclosed in official materials. Logline: A modern reconception that returns the monster to nightmare, driven by Cronin’s hands-on craft and accumulating dread. Rating: TBA. Production: In the can. Positioning: classic monster revival with auteur stamp.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A domestic haunting scenario that frames the panic through a preteen’s flickering personal vantage. Rating: forthcoming. Production: fully shot. Positioning: studio-backed, star-driven 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 parody reboot that satirizes present-day genre chatter and true-crime crazes. Rating: undetermined. Production: fall 2025 shoot penciled in. Positioning: mainstream summer comedy-horror.

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 overseas twist in tone and setting. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: production in New Zealand. Positioning: graphic series entry optimized for PLF.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: TBA publicly. Top cast: awaiting confirmation. Logline: The Further reopens, with a different family entangled with old terrors. Rating: undetermined. Production: targeting a summer lensing window for late-summer release. Positioning: trusted supernatural label in a supportive window.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: TBA publicly. Top cast: undisclosed. Logline: A from-scratch rebuild designed to recreate the franchise from the ground up, with an focus on survival-core horror over set-piece spectacle. Rating: undetermined. Production: in active development with set date. Positioning: canon-conscious reboot with mainstream reach.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: pending. Logline: strategically hidden. Rating: forthcoming. Production: moving forward. Positioning: filmmaker showcase with teaser-first cadence.

Werwulf (Focus Features, December 25, 2026)
Director: Robert Eggers. Top cast: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, with other regulars expected. Logline: A medieval werewolf story built on era-faithful speech and ancient menace. Rating: TBD. Production: in preproduction for holiday debut. Positioning: high-craft holiday horror with awards-season tail.

Wolf Creek: Legacy (Cineverse, TBA 2026)
Director: Greg McLean. Top cast: John Jarratt expected to return as Mick Taylor. Logline: The Australian outback slasher returns, with a classic theatrical rollout before platforming. Status: slot unsettled, fall projected.

Why 2026 lands now

Three nuts-and-bolts forces structure this lineup. First, production that eased or rearranged in 2024 needed spacing on the calendar. Horror can backfill quickly because scripts often use fewer locations, fewer large-scale VFX sequences, and accelerated 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, social conversation converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will leverage bite-size scare clips from test screenings, precision scare clips synced to Thursday previews, and experiential pop-ups that power influencer posts. It is a repeatable playbook because it works.

Programming arithmetic plays a role. Early corridors for family and capes are leaner in 2026, opening usable real estate for genre entries that can command a weekend or operate as the older-skew option. January is the prime example. Four tonal lanes of horror will jostle across five weekends, which lets WOM accrue cleanly. Summer provides the other window. The satire rides the animated and action tide, then the hard-R entry can exploit a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Money matters, ratings, and surprise hits

Budgets remain in the strike zone. Most of the films above will fit below the $40–$50 million line, with many far below. That allows for strong PLF footprints 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 value-budget genre can own weekends with minimal competition, and again in late summer, where horror often becomes the conversation when tentpoles tire. The 2026 slate is set up to use those gaps. January could easily deliver the first surprise over-performer 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 imp source amplify the tail, with copyright pickups boosting Universal’s slate and Shudder driving evangelism for Cineverse titles. Anticipate a robust PVOD phase across the board, since horror fans have shown a willingness to pay for convenience after an opening weekend, especially when word of mouth is strong.

Audience journey through the year

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers flow and breadth. January is a banquet, February delivers a legacy slasher, April reanimates a Universal monster, May and June provide a two-hit supernatural combo 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 cold, literate nightmare. That is how you keep the discourse going and the seats filled without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can ratchet upward, using earlier releases to set up the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors respond well to the spacing. Horror delivers regular Thursday spikes, lean footprints, 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 tactility, sound, and camera work 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

Slots move. Ratings change. Casts update. But the spine of 2026 horror is firm. There is brand power where it counts, fresh vision where it counts, and a calendar that shows studios sense the cadence 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 closing-window arthouse pickup join the party. For now, the job is simple, edit tight trailers, lock the reveals, and let the screams sell the seats.