Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed revives primeval horror, a pulse pounding shocker, debuting Oct 2025 on top streamers

This chilling metaphysical nightmare movie from writer / creative lead Andrew Chiaramonte, liberating an age-old malevolence when foreigners become subjects in a devilish ritual. Available this October 2nd, 2025, on Amazon Prime Video, Google’s YouTube, Google’s Play platform, iTunes, Apple TV Plus, and Fandango streaming.

L.A., CA (August 8, 2025) – get set for *Young & Cursed*, a unnerving episode of endurance and primeval wickedness that will redefine scare flicks this cool-weather season. Visualized by rising new wave horror talent Andrew Chiaramonte, this harrowing and gothic suspense flick follows five teens who are stirred locked in a remote structure under the menacing will of Kyra, a haunted figure haunted by a ancient scriptural evil. Arm yourself to be ensnared by a narrative ride that combines gut-punch terror with ancient myths, releasing on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on October 2, 2025.


Demonic control has been a enduring motif in screenwriting. In *Young & Cursed*, that tradition is inverted when the fiends no longer emerge outside the characters, but rather from within. This suggests the most terrifying version of the group. The result is a psychologically brutal cognitive warzone where the conflict becomes a relentless tug-of-war between righteousness and malevolence.


In a remote wilderness, five youths find themselves marooned under the sinister dominion and overtake of a enigmatic entity. As the ensemble becomes vulnerable to break her curse, detached and tracked by forces mind-shattering, they are driven to face their inner demons while the time relentlessly strikes toward their final moment.


In *Young & Cursed*, mistrust builds and teams fracture, pressuring each survivor to challenge their essence and the notion of independent thought itself. The intensity climb with every short lapse, delivering a scare-fueled ride that marries mystical fear with inner turmoil.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my goal was to channel core terror, an malevolence rooted in antiquity, manifesting in mental cracks, and navigating a power that peels away humanity when choice is taken.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Portraying Kyra demanded embodying something more primal than sorrow. She is ignorant until the evil takes hold, and that evolution is soul-crushing because it is so raw.”

Debut Info

*Young & Cursed* will be available for audience access beginning October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google’s store, Apple iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango on-demand—allowing viewers anywhere can survive this terrifying film.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just shared a new follow-up preview for *Young & Cursed*, up to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a evolution to its intro video, which has garnered over notable views.


In addition to its domestic release, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has revealed that *Young & Cursed* will also be available worldwide, bringing the film to lovers of terror across nations.


Be sure to catch this soul-jarring ride through nightmares. Experience *Young & Cursed* this horror drop to acknowledge these nightmarish insights about inner darkness.


For featurettes, special features, and reveals directly from production, follow @YoungCursedOfficial across your favorite networks and visit our horror hub.





Current horror’s inflection point: the 2025 season American release plan Mixes old-world possession, art-house nightmares, plus tentpole growls

Spanning fight-to-live nightmare stories drawn from scriptural legend and stretching into series comebacks paired with cutting indie sensibilities, 2025 is coalescing into the most variegated together with intentionally scheduled year in the past ten years.

The 2025 horror calendar is not just busy, it is strategic. studio majors set cornerstones through proven series, simultaneously SVOD players prime the fall with discovery plays in concert with archetypal fear. On the festival side, the independent cohort is carried on the echoes from an unprecedented 2024 fest surge. With Halloween holding the peak, the schedule beyond October is tightly engineered. A fat September–October lane is customary now, but this year, strategies include January, spring, and mid-summer. The audience is primed, studios are surgical, which means 2025 may end up the most intentional cycle yet.

Major Studio Plans with Mini-Major Flex: High-craft horror returns

The top end is active. If 2024 prepared the terrain, 2025 scales the plan.

Universal’s schedule leads off the quarter with a statement play: a modernized Wolf Man, leaving behind the period European setting, but a crisp modern milieu. Under director Leigh Whannell and starring Christopher Abbott with Julia Garner, this version roots the lycanthropy in family fracture. The shift goes beyond the body, touching marriage, parenting, and raw humanity. Booked into mid January, it backs a move to shape winter into a prestige corridor, not a discard corridor.

As spring rolls in, Clown in a Cornfield bows, a YA slasher novel refit as minimal menace. Guided by Eli Craig anchored by Katie Douglas and Kevin Durand, it moves like barn born dread with razor satire. Beneath the facade, it probes hometown suspicion, boomer to zoomer divides, and mob retribution. Initial fest notes point to real bite.

As summer winds down, Warner Bros. rolls out the capstone within its surest horror brand: The Conjuring: Last Rites. The Warrens are back with Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson, the film signals catharsis as it engages a widely cited real case. Granted the structure is classic, Chaves seems to angle for a plaintive, inward final note. It is dated for early September, granting margin before October’s crush.

The Black Phone 2 follows. Originally slated for early summer, its move to an October release suggests confidence. Derrickson returns to the helm, and those signature textures resurface: vintage toned fear, trauma centered writing, plus uncanny supernatural grammar. This run ups the stakes, with a deeper exploration into the “grabber” mythology and how grief haunts generations.

Closing the prime list is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a film that does not need traditional marketing to sell tickets. The next entry deepens the tale, thickens the animatronic pantheon, with a bullseye on teens and thirty something nostalgics. It hits in December, securing the winter cap.

Digital Originals: Modest spend, serious shock

While theaters bet on familiarity, platforms are greenlighting boldly, and the needle moves.

A high ambition play arrives with Weapons, a forensic chill anthology interlacing three eras linked by a mass vanishing. Led by Zach Cregger including Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, the title blends fear with dramatic gravity. With a late summer theatrical bow and fall streaming drop, it may catalyze deconstruction threads like Barbarian.

More contained by design is Together, a room scale body horror descent pairing Alison Brie with Dave Franco. Situated in an out of the way rental during a failed escape, the movie follows love and envy and self denial into corporeal breakdown. It moves between affection and rot, a triptych into codependent hell. Though no platform has officially staked a release date, it is virtually assured for fall.

Then there is Sinners, a Depression era vampire folk fable starring Michael B. Jordan. Rendered in sepia depth and layered biblical metaphor, it nods to There Will Be Blood beside Let the Right One In. The piece examines American religious trauma via supernatural allegory. Early test screens tag it as a top talked streaming debut.

Other streamer plays queue softly: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper all mine grief and vanishing and identity, running metaphor first.

The Possession Runs Deep: Young & Cursed

Bowing October 2 on major streamers, Young & Cursed plays as a rare fusion, spare in setting, sweeping in lore. From writer director 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. When evening turns to black, Kyra’s control expands, an encroaching force weaponizing fears, cracks, and guilt.

This fear is psychologically driven, pulsing with primal myth. Rather than another exorcism film centered on Catholic rites or Latin incantations, this story returns to something older, something darker. Lilith is not summoned by priests, she rises from trauma, muteness, and human fault lines. Turning possession inward syncs Young & Cursed to the trend of character led dramas draped in genre.

The Halloween window on Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play, and Fandango at Home frames the film as counter to sequel saturation and creature revivals. It is a smart play. No bloated mythology. No brand fatigue. Straight psychological chill, boxed and tight, aimed at the binge, pause, and pulse habits of streamers. Among spectacle, Young & Cursed might win by restraint, then release.

Festival Badges as Fuel

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF act as proving grounds for the next waves. They are increasingly launchpads rather than showcases.

This year, Fantastic Fest confirms a strong horror slate. Primate kicks off with tropical body horror and gets Cronenberg Herzog cross talk. Whistle, a revenge folktale steeped in Aztec myth, is tapped to close with fire.

Midnight entries like If I Had Legs I’d Kick You are getting buzz not just for their titles but for their execution. Backed by A24, it skewers toxic fandom amid a convention lockdown, poised to break big.

SXSW bowed Clown in a Cornfield while feeding deal chatter for microbudget haunts. Sundance is expected to unspool its usual crop of grief soaked elevated horror, and Tribeca’s genre box tilting urban, social, and surreal.

Festival playbooks now prize branding as much as discovery. That wreath is now a starting gun, not the finish.

Legacy Brands: Sequels, Reboots, Reinventions

The franchise bench is sturdier and more targeted than lately.

Fear Street: Prom Queen comes in July with franchise revival, new lead, retro styling. Unlike prior entries, this one leans into camp and prom night melodrama. Imagine tiaras, smeared red, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 returns in late June, poised to elaborate techno horror lore through new players and AI nightmares. The initial entry’s meme life and streaming legs push Universal to scale up.

Then there is The Long Walk, an adaptation of one of Stephen King’s earliest and most harrowing works, under Francis Lawrence, it shows as a grim dystopian parable set in survival horror, a youth walk ending only in death. With clear targeting, it could become The Hunger Games for horror grown ups.

Beyond that, reboots and sequels such as Hell House LLC: Lineage, V/H/S/Halloween, The Toxic Avenger, and Anaconda dot the year, often holding for windows or late pickups.

Signals and Trends

Ancient myth goes wide
Young & Cursed with Lilith and Whistle with Aztec curses both signal ancient texts and symbols. This is not nostalgia, it is a reclamation of pre Christian archetypes. Horror does more than scare, it reminds that evil predates us.

Body horror returns
Projects including Together, Weapons, and Keeper re center the flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation now read as metaphors for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

Streaming originals get teeth
Disposable horror filler days on platforms have passed. Streamers are investing in real scripts, real directors, and real marketing pushes. Releases like Weapons and Sinners are elevated to events, not just content.

Festival momentum becomes leverage
Wreaths work as currency, buying release slots, placement, and press. A film minus festival planning in 2025 risks getting lost.

Theaters are a trust fall
Theater slots go to likely overachievers or franchise starters. The remainder goes PVOD or hybrid. Horror still lives in theaters, more curated than broad.

Forecast: Autumn overload with a winter wildcard

With Young & Cursed, The Conjuring: Last Rites, The Black Phone 2, and Weapons stacked into September and October, fall saturates. Indies like Bone Lake and Keeper will grind for attention. Anticipate possible date slides into early 2026 or platform moves.

December holds on Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, though a stealth streamer release may land late. Since big films lean mythic, a final monster or exorcism play can claim space.

The success of horror in 2025 hinges less on a single title and more on how a diverse slate reaches a scattered, segmented audience. The assignment is not to chase the next Get Out, it is to build horror that endures beyond box office.



The next fear Year Ahead: brand plays, non-franchise titles, in tandem with A jammed Calendar geared toward Scares

Dek: The upcoming terror cycle lines up from day one with a January bottleneck, before it spreads through summer corridors, and continuing into the winter holidays, blending legacy muscle, fresh ideas, and well-timed counter-scheduling. Major distributors and platforms are prioritizing tight budgets, theatrical exclusivity first, and buzz-forward plans that transform genre titles into four-quadrant talking points.

The landscape of horror in 2026

The genre has solidified as the bankable option in programming grids, a vertical that can lift when it clicks and still safeguard the drag when it fails to connect. After 2023 showed strategy teams that efficiently budgeted pictures can galvanize the discourse, 2024 kept energy high with auteur-driven buzzy films and sleeper breakouts. The upswing moved into the 2025 frame, where reboots and awards-minded projects made clear there is appetite for a variety of tones, from returning installments to original one-offs that resonate abroad. The result for 2026 is a run that seems notably aligned across the field, with mapped-out bands, a spread of known properties and new pitches, and a tightened priority on release windows that amplify PVOD and streaming on premium digital rental and OTT platforms.

Distribution heads claim the category now behaves like a utility player on the grid. Horror can debut on a wide range of weekends, furnish a tight logline for spots and reels, and punch above weight with viewers that line up on opening previews and stick through the sophomore frame if the picture connects. Coming out of a strike-bent pipeline, the 2026 configuration demonstrates assurance in that playbook. The calendar begins with a crowded January block, then leans on spring and early summer for genre counterpoints, while keeping space for a autumn stretch that flows toward late October and into the next week. The layout also shows the tightening integration of indie distributors and streamers that can platform and widen, create conversation, and move wide at the sweet spot.

A second macro trend is franchise tending across shared universes and long-running brands. Major shops are not just producing another chapter. They are seeking to position story carry-over with a must-see charge, whether that is a title design that announces a recalibrated tone or a casting pivot that links a new entry to a vintage era. At the meanwhile, the auteurs behind the high-profile originals are favoring tactile craft, practical gags and place-driven backdrops. That pairing yields the 2026 slate a smart balance horror of brand comfort and freshness, which is the formula for international play.

The majors’ 2026 approach

Paramount marks the early tempo with two big-ticket plays that run the tonal gamut. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with Kevin Williamson in the helm and Neve Campbell back at the spine, framing it as both a cross-generational handoff and a back-to-basics character-forward chapter. Production is active in Atlanta, and the authorial approach hints at a roots-evoking campaign without going over the last two entries’ sibling arc. A campaign is expected centered on brand visuals, character previews, and a tiered teaser plan arriving in late fall. Distribution is cinema-first via Paramount.

Paramount also dusts off a once-mighty spoof franchise with Scary Movie 6 on June 12, 2026, directed by Michael Tiddes. Anna Faris and Regina Hall are reforming, with the Wayans brothers involved in creative roles for the first time since the early 2000s, a headline the campaign will spotlight. As a summer alternative, this one will build broad awareness through meme-friendly cuts, with the horror spoof format fitting quick updates to whatever owns the conversation that spring.

Universal has three differentiated releases. SOULM8TE launches January 9, 2026, a AI-tinged spinoff from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The premise is crisp, heartbroken, and premise-first: a grieving man installs an artificial companion that grows into a lethal partner. The date sets it at the front of a busy month, with the studio’s marketing likely to replay uncanny-valley stunts and quick hits that fuses companionship and creep.

On May 8, 2026, the studio books an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely interpreted as the feature developed under internal titles in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The official slate currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which sets up a title drop to become an marketing beat closer to the initial tease. The timing hands the studio a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles circle other weekends.

Supplementing the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film takes October 23, 2026, a slot he has made his own before. His entries are sold as marquee events, with a teaser with minimal detail and a follow-up trailer set that convey vibe without spoilers the concept. The Halloween runway affords Universal to maximize 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, links with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček steers, with Souheila Yacoub starring. The franchise has demonstrated that a flesh-and-blood, prosthetic-heavy aesthetic can feel cinematic on a lean spend. Frame it as a blood-soaked summer horror charge that maximizes foreign markets, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most offshore territories.

Sony’s horror bench is surprisingly deep. The studio rolls out two series moves in the back half. An untitled Insidious film premieres August 21, 2026, sustaining a trusty supernatural brand in motion while the spin-off branch builds quietly. Sony has recalibrated on this title before, but the current plan plants it in late summer, where the brand has often excelled.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil returns in what the studio is describing as a fresh 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 focus to serve both core fans and new audiences. The fall slot hands Sony window to build materials around environmental design, and monster aesthetics, elements that can accelerate premium booking interest and cosplayer momentum.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, books a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Robert Eggers’ Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film continues the filmmaker’s run of period horror shaped by obsessive craft and dialect, this time driven by werewolf stories. The company has already announced the holiday for a holiday release, a confidence marker in the auteur as a specialty play that can build and expand if early reception is strong.

Streamers and platform exclusives

Platform plans for 2026 run on stable tracks. Universal’s genre entries head to copyright after a big-screen and PVOD window, a ordering that fortifies both launch urgency and platform bumps in the late-window. Prime Video will mix library titles with world buys and limited runs in theaters when the data backs it. Max and Hulu play their strengths in archive usage, using editorial spots, holiday hubs, and featured rows to maximize the tail on lifetime take. Netflix plays opportunist about Netflix originals and festival snaps, dating horror entries near launch and framing as events launches with surge campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, uses a paired of precision releases and speedy platforming that funnels enthusiasm into trials. That will prove important for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before pivoting to horror-fan channels in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ treats carefully horror on a situational basis. The platform has signaled readiness to secure select projects with acclaimed directors or celebrity-led packages, then give them a limited theatrical run in partnership with exhibitors to meet Oscar thresholds or to gather buzz before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney domestic still pulls from the 20th Century Studios slate, a meaningful lever for month-over-month retention when the genre conversation swells.

Specialty and indie breakouts

Cineverse is structuring a 2026 track with two franchise steps. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The offer is uncomplicated: the same foggy, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a cult item, reimagined for modern mix and grade. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a fall frame, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher get redirected here universe. The distributor has telegraphed a theatrical-first plan for Legacy, an encouraging sign for fans of the relentless series and for exhibitors seeking adult skew in the fall weeks.

Focus will cultivate the auteur lane with Werwulf, marshalling the project through autumn festivals if the cut is ready, then deploying the holiday dates to broaden. That positioning has shown results for filmmaker-driven genre with mainstream crossovers. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not dated many 2026 horror titles in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines generally solidify after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A solid projection is a series of late-summer and fall platformers that can go wider if reception justifies. Plan on an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that plays Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work in parallel, using limited theatrical to ignite evangelism that fuels their subscriber base.

Brands and originals

By count, the 2026 slate tilts in favor of the series side. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all tap cultural cachet. The potential drawback, as ever, is diminishing returns. The workable fix is to pitch each entry as a new angle. Paramount is emphasizing character and lineage in Scream 7, Sony is hinting at a new foundation for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is driving this page a French-tinted vision from a buzzed-about director. Those choices count when the audience has so many options and social sentiment swings fast.

Non-franchise titles and director-first projects add air. 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 tight, eerie tech hook. Werwulf emphasizes period craft and an uncompromising tone. Even when the title is not based on familiar IP, the packaging is familiar enough to turn curiosity into pre-sales and preview-night crowds.

Comparable trends from recent years announce the model. In 2023, a exclusive cinema model that held distribution windows did not foreclose a simultaneous release test from paying off when the brand was compelling. In 2024, auteur craft horror rose in big-format auditoriums. In 2025, a resurgence of a beloved infection saga proved again that global horror franchises can still feel renewed when they alter lens and grow scope. That last point is directly relevant to Sony’s 28 Years Later plan, which advances January 16, 2026 with 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, this time directed by Nia DaCosta from a script by Alex Garland. The dual-chapter plan, with chapters shot in tandem, allows marketing to cross-link entries through protagonists and motifs and to leave creative active without lulls.

How the films are being made

The production chatter behind 2026 horror point to a continued shift toward real, location-led craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not resemble any recent iteration of the property, a stance that fits with the physical-effects bias he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film finished principal and is on track for its April 17, 2026 date. Marketing will likely that elevates mood and dread rather than roller-coaster spectacle, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership allowing efficient spending.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has said Werwulf as the most shadowed project he has tackled, which tracks with a historical setting and period-accurate language, a combination that can make for deep sound design and a earthy, elemental chill on the big screen. Focus will likely preview this aesthetic in behind-the-scenes pieces and below-the-line spotlights before rolling out a tease that centers atmosphere over story, a move that has resonated for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is tuned for practical nastiness, a signature of the series that performs globally in red-band trailers and generates shareable screening reactions from early screenings. Scream 7 delivers a self-aware reset that puts the original star at center. Resident Evil will fly or stall on creature work and production design, which favor convention activations and managed asset releases. Insidious tends to be a theatrical sound showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the auditorium case feel must-have. Look for trailers that foreground precise sound design, deep-bass stingers, and sudden silences that explode in larger rooms.

From winter to holidays

January is full. 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 somber counterpoint amid bigger brand plays. The month concludes with Send Help on January 30 via 20th Century Studios, a stranded thriller from Sam Raimi that puts a star forward in Rachel McAdams. The competition here is real, but the palette of tones creates a lane for each, and the five-week structure gives each runway for each if word of mouth persists.

Late Q1 and spring tee up summer. Scream 7 rolls out February 27 with brand energy. In April, New Line’s The Mummy resurrects a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once was aligned with genre counterprogramming and now can handle big openers. The untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 connects into summer while maintaining horror’s hold on early May weekends that are not claimed by superheroes or family tentpoles.

Summer heightens the contrast. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is jokier and broader, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 offers severe intensity. The counterprogramming logic is workable. The spoof can connect next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest serves older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have shuffled through big rooms.

Late-season stretch leans IP. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives Sony a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously done well. Resident Evil steps in after September 18, a shoulder season window that still links to Halloween marketing beats. The Peele event occupies October 23 and will captivate cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely augmented by a peekaboo tease plan and limited previews that stress concept over spoilers.

Awards-adjacent specialty. Werwulf on December 25 is a marker that genre can play the holidays when packaged as craft prestige horror. Focus has done this before, deliberate rollout, then using critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to hold in chatter into January. If the film resonates with critics, the studio can expand in the first week of 2027 while riding holiday momentum and card redemption.

Embedded title notes

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting on a rolling basis as production carries on. Logline: Sidney returns to challenge a new Ghostface while the narrative reconnects to the original film’s DNA. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: classic-DNA reset with a current angle.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A bereaved man’s artificial companion escalates into something seductively lethal. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming finished 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 enlarges the frame beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult ascends in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Shot back-to-back with the first film. Positioning: prestige apocalypse continuation.

Return to Silent Hill (Cineverse, January 23, 2026)
Director: Christophe Gans. Top cast: TBA in updated campaign materials. Logline: A man travels back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to be swallowed by a warped reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Completed and U.S. theatrical set. Positioning: ambience-forward 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 demanding boss fight to survive on a isolated island as the hierarchy tilts and mistrust rises. Rating: TBA. Production: Finished. Positioning: star-front survival film from a master.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles in the vault in official materials. Logline: A from-today rework that returns the monster to dread, rooted in Cronin’s in-camera craft and creeping dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Wrapped. 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 closed-door haunting piece that routes the horror through a young child’s volatile personal vantage. Rating: TBD. Production: fully shot. Positioning: studio-backed, star-driven ghostly suspense.

Scary Movie 6 (Paramount, June 12, 2026)
Director: Michael Tiddes. Top cast: Anna Faris, Regina Hall, with the Wayans brothers reuniting creatively. Logline: {A parody return that riffs on of-the-moment horror beats and true crime preoccupations. Rating: pending. Production: principal photography set for fall 2025. Positioning: broad-lane summer entry.

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 globe-spanning twist in tone and setting. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: cameras rolling in New Zealand. Positioning: graphic series entry optimized for PLF.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: to be announced in marketing. Top cast: TBA. Logline: The Further unfurls again, with a unlucky family lashed to older hauntings. Rating: not yet rated. Production: eying a summer shoot for late-summer slot. Positioning: consistent franchise performer in a beneficial frame.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: pending public reveal. Top cast: forthcoming. Logline: A ground-up reset designed to re-engineer the franchise from the ground up, with an emphasis on survival-first horror over action-forward bombast. Rating: TBA. Production: in active development with set date. Positioning: game-faithful modern reboot with crossover potential.

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

Werwulf (Focus Features, December 25, 2026)
Director: Robert Eggers. Top cast: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, with other regulars expected. Logline: A medieval werewolf story built on antique diction and elemental fear. Rating: not yet rated. Production: building toward Christmas Day opening. Positioning: auteur prestige horror aimed at holiday corridor with crafts prospects.

Wolf Creek: Legacy (Cineverse, TBA 2026)
Director: Greg McLean. Top cast: John Jarratt expected to return as Mick Taylor. Logline: The Australian outback slasher returns, with a conventional theatrical window prior to platforming. Status: window fluid, autumn forecast.

Why 2026, why now

Three nuts-and-bolts forces drive this lineup. First, production that decelerated or shuffled in 2024 required runway on the datebook. Horror can plug those gaps fast because scripts often call for fewer locales, fewer large-scale VFX sequences, and shorter timelines. Second, studios have become more orderly about windows. Theatrical exclusivity remains the goal for most of these films, followed by PVOD and then platform streaming, a sequence that has consistently overdelivered vs. straight-to-streaming premieres. Third, online chatter converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will mine turnkey scare beats from test screenings, metered scare clips timed to Thursday night previews, and experiential pop-ups that serve as influencer content. It is a repeatable playbook because it works.

Factor four is the scheduling calculus. Family and cape-heavy lanes thin out in early 2026, providing runway for genre entries that can capture a weekend or stand as the older-leaning counter. January is the prime example. Four tonal lanes of horror will share space across five weekends, which reduces inter-title cannibalization. Summer provides the other window. The lampoon benefits from family and action buoyancy, then the hard-R entry can capitalize on a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Financials, ratings, and sleeper angles

Budgets remain in the target range. Most of the films above will come in under $40–$50 million, with many far below. That allows for aggressive PLF bookings 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 stealth-hit search 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 press those advantages. January could easily deliver the first unexpected breakout of the year, and August into September gives Sony an avenue to hold screens with back-to-back supernatural IP while still leaving room for an indie breakout.

Internationally, brand recognition helps Resident Evil, Evil Dead, and Scream travel, while 28 Years Later benefits from a British setting and returning talent. Werwulf and The Mummy will lean on auteur and classic-monster awareness abroad. Streamers will amplify the tail, with copyright pickups boosting Universal’s slate and Shudder driving evangelism for Cineverse titles. Forecast a healthy PVOD window broadly, 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 cadence and diversity. January is a tasting table, February delivers a legacy slasher, April reawakens a Universal monster, May and June provide a paranormal one-two for date nights and group outings, July turns feral, 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 scale over time, using earlier releases to seed the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors like the spacing. Horror delivers consistent Thursday swells, optimized footprints, and strong PLF uptake when the creative supports it. The 2026 slate has at least three titles that can command PLF, with The Mummy, Evil Dead Burn, and Werwulf all showcasing grain, acoustics, 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 Strong 2026 Horizon

Timing shifts. Ratings change. Casts refresh. But the spine of 2026 horror is firm. There is brand gravity where needed, distinct vision where it matters, and a calendar that shows studios track how and when scares land. 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-breaking specialty acquisition join the party. For now, the job is simple, craft precise trailers, lock the reveals, and let the chills sell the seats.