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

An bone-chilling occult shockfest from screenwriter / filmmaker Andrew Chiaramonte, unleashing an primeval malevolence when unfamiliar people become pawns in a malevolent ritual. Streaming on October 2, 2025, on Prime Video, YouTube streaming, Google’s digital store, iTunes, Apple’s TV+ service, and Fandango platform.

Hollywood, CA (August 8th, 2025) – stay alert for *Young & Cursed*, a nerve-wracking story of endurance and mythic evil that will transform horror this autumn. Guided by rising imaginative director Andrew Chiaramonte, this pressure-packed and gothic feature follows five lost souls who suddenly rise sealed in a far-off cottage under the unfriendly power of Kyra, a tormented girl haunted by a ancient religious nightmare. Prepare to be seized by a filmic journey that combines visceral dread with mythic lore, debuting on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on October 2, 2025.


Supernatural inhabitation has been a enduring concept in cinema. In *Young & Cursed*, that concept is reversed when the fiends no longer form outside the characters, but rather from their core. This illustrates the most terrifying corner of the protagonists. The result is a harrowing internal warfare where the intensity becomes a soul-crushing struggle between divinity and wickedness.


In a unforgiving natural abyss, five figures find themselves stuck under the evil aura and control of a elusive person. As the group becomes submissive to oppose her curse, isolated and tracked by spirits beyond comprehension, they are compelled to battle their emotional phantoms while the clock unceasingly ticks toward their demise.


In *Young & Cursed*, anxiety intensifies and ties fracture, driving each person to examine their values and the idea of free will itself. The cost escalate with every second, delivering a terror ride that weaves together otherworldly panic with human fear.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my goal was to uncover primitive panic, an presence that predates humanity, channeling itself through fragile psyche, and wrestling with a force that erodes the self when volition is erased.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Playing Kyra meant evoking something beyond human emotion. She is clueless until the demon emerges, and that change is emotionally raw because it is so close.”

Release & Availability

*Young & Cursed* will be unleashed for streaming beginning October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google’s store, Apple iTunes, Apple’s streaming platform, and Fandango at Home—offering streamers worldwide can dive into this demonic journey.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just uploaded a new official trailer #2 for *Young & Cursed*, live to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a sequel to its release of trailer #1, which has been viewed over six-figure audience.


In addition to its regional launch, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has declared that *Young & Cursed* will also be streamed globally, presenting the nightmare to global fright lovers.


Be sure to catch this haunted journey into fear. Face *Young & Cursed* this horror drop to acknowledge these spiritual awakenings about the human condition.


For featurettes, special features, and alerts directly from production, follow @YACMovie across online outlets and visit the official movie site.





Horror’s Turning Point: the 2025 season American release plan blends old-world possession, independent shockers, together with legacy-brand quakes

From survivor-centric dread infused with old testament echoes and extending to IP renewals paired with focused festival visions, 2025 is shaping up as the most textured combined with blueprinted year in recent memory.

Call it full, but it is also focused. studio majors hold down the year with known properties, even as OTT services pack the fall with new perspectives paired with legend-coded dread. At the same time, the independent cohort is catching the kinetic energy of a record-setting 2024 festival season. As Halloween remains the genre’s crown jewel, the remaining months are slotted with surgical care. A dense September through October runway is now a rite of passage, however this time, slates are opening January, spring, and mid-summer. Horror fans are craving, studios are precise, which means 2025 is positioned to be the most designed season yet.

Studio Playbook and Mini-Major Tactics: Prestige-leaning dread rebounds

The top end is active. If 2024 set the base, 2025 compounds the move.

Universal’s distribution arm starts the year with a headline swing: a modernized Wolf Man, stepping away from the classic old-country village, in a modern-day environment. From director Leigh Whannell featuring Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner, this approach fixes the lycanthropy within intimate rupture. The arc is bodily and domestic, about marriage, caregiving, and fragile humanity. dated for mid January, it helps remake the winter trough with prestige offerings, not discard thrillers.

Spring brings Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher conversion presented as stripped terror. Steered by Eli Craig featuring turns by Katie Douglas and Kevin Durand, it reads as gore kissed small town horror with wry bite. Behind the grin, it unpacks local hysteria, generational chasms, and crowd justice. Festival whispers say it is sharp.

As summer eases, the Warner Bros. banner releases the last chapter within its surest horror brand: The Conjuring: Last Rites. Ed and Lorraine Warren return with Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson, the film signals catharsis as it engages a widely cited real case. Though the outline is tried, Chaves is expected to tune it to a grieving, self reflective color. It is dated for early September, granting margin before October’s crush.

Arriving later is The Black Phone 2. Once set for early summer, the October pivot signals belief. Derrickson re boards, and the defining traits of the first sleeper return: retro dread, trauma centered writing, paired with unsettling supernatural order. This run ups the stakes, with a deeper exploration into the “grabber” mythology and how grief haunts generations.

Completing the marquee stack is Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a movie that scarcely needs conventional ads. The next entry deepens the tale, broadens the animatronic terror cast, while aiming for teen viewers and thirty something game loyalists. It drops in December, cornering year end horror.

Digital Originals: Small budgets, sharp fangs

While theaters bet on familiarity, platforms are embracing risk, and engagement climbs.

A top daring platform piece is Weapons, a cold case horror anthology splicing three ages joined by a mass disappearance. With Zach Cregger directing including Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, the piece merges terror with dramatic mass. Opening theatrically late summer ahead of fall SVOD, it will likely trigger thread wars and analysis videos, recalling Barbarian.

At the smaller scale sits Together, a body horror duet starring Alison Brie and Dave Franco. Situated in an out of the way rental during a failed escape, the film explores what happens when love, envy, and self hatred merge into physical decay. It comes off amorous, macabre, and bracingly uneasy, a three act loop into codependent hell. Before a platform date is locked, it looks like a certain fall stream.

Then there is Sinners, a thirties set vampire folk saga starring Michael B. Jordan. Captured with warm sepia and heavy biblical metaphor, it mirrors There Will Be Blood meeting Let the Right One In. The piece examines American religious trauma via supernatural allegory. Initial test audience notes point to a buzzy streaming debut.

A handful of other streaming indies hover in the wings: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper all tap into themes of grief, disappearance, and identity, often using horror as metaphor instead of spectacle.

Deep Possession Currents: Young & Cursed

Landing October 2 across key streamers, Young & Cursed stands as a rare hybrid, both intimate in scope and mythic in reach. Written and helmed by Andrew Chiaramonte, the story trails five strangers who come to in a far off forest cabin, ruled by Kyra, a young woman possessed by the ancient biblical demon Lilith. When darkness comes, Kyra’s power swells, a penetrating force tapping their private fears, soft spots, and remorse.

The dread here runs psychological, charged by primal myth. Not another exorcism story reliant on Catholic rite and Latin phrase, this film taps something older, something darker. Lilith resists liturgy, she blooms through trauma, secrecy, and human delicacy. 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 is a clever angle. No bloated mythology. No IP hangover. Simply psychological fear, lean and taut, built for the binge then recover rhythm. Against fireworks, Young & Cursed might stand apart by stillness, then shock.

Festival Origins, Market Outcomes

Fantastic Fest, SXSW, Tribeca, and TIFF act as proving grounds for the next waves. This cycle, they are launchpads first and showcases second.

Fantastic Fest fields a robust horror set this year. Primate, a tropical body horror opening night title, is drawing comparisons to both Cronenberg and Herzog. Whistle, a folkloric revenge thriller drenched in Aztec lore, is set to close the fest hot.

Midnight offerings such as If I Had Legs I’d Kick You surge on execution beyond the hook. The A24 fueled satire of toxic fandom in a con lockdown has breakout energy.

SXSW staged Clown in a Cornfield and lined up microbudget haunts for talks. Sundance is expected to unspool a familiar crop of grief steeped elevated horror, with Tribeca’s genre menu reading urban, social, and surreal.

The festival game increasingly values branding over mere discovery. The laurel is campaign ignition, not epilogue.

Legacy Lines: Next Chapters, New Starts, New Shapes

The sequel reboot ecosystem reads stronger and more precise.

Fear Street: Prom Queen hits July to revive the 90s line with fresh lead and VHS vibe. In contrast to earlier chapters, it skews camp and prom night melodrama. Think tiaras, fake blood, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 arrives late June, set to enlarge techno horror mythology with fresh faces and AI bred menaces. The initial entry’s meme life and streaming legs push Universal to scale up.

The Long Walk adapts an early, scathing Stephen King work, led by Francis Lawrence, it lands as a ruthless dystopian allegory couched in survival horror, a march where no one wins. With clear targeting, it could become The Hunger Games for horror grown ups.

Across the board, reboots and sequels such as Hell House LLC: Lineage, V/H/S/Halloween, The Toxic Avenger, and Anaconda fill gaps, most looking for tactical dates or fast pickups.

Trend Lines

Mythic lanes mainstream
From Lilith in Young & Cursed across to Aztec curses in Whistle, slates mine ancient texts and symbols. Rather than nostalgia, it reclaims pre Christian archetypes. Horror pushes past jump scares, it points to ancient evil.

Body horror resurges
With Together, Weapons, and Keeper, the genre goes back to the flesh. Mutation, infection, transformation function as metaphors for heartbreak, grief, and regret.

SVOD originals harden up
Disposable horror filler days on platforms have passed. Services bankroll legitimate writing, legitimate directors, and proper media. Titles such as Weapons and Sinners are treated as events, not mere content.

Festival hype becomes leverage
Festival seals operate as leverage for distribution lanes and press windows. In 2025, a horror film lacking festival plan may fade.

Theaters are a trust fall
Theatrical is reserved for titles believed to overperform or sow sequels. Most others angle PVOD or hybrid. Horror continues in theaters, in narrower curated lanes.

The Road Ahead: 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 including Bone Lake and Keeper will wrestle for room. Do not be surprised if one or two move to early 2026 or switch platforms.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 anchors December, and a surprise streaming drop could still arrive late. When the heavy hitters lean mythic, a last creature feature or exorcism can still fit.

The trick lies in diverse menus finding segmented crowds, not single title bets. The plan is not to clone Get Out, it is to craft horror that lives on beyond box office.



The upcoming spook slate: returning titles, universe starters, together with A Crowded Calendar optimized for shocks

Dek: The brand-new horror cycle builds right away with a January wave, then rolls through the warm months, and deep into the winter holidays, braiding name recognition, new voices, and shrewd release strategy. Studios and platforms are betting on responsible budgets, theatrical exclusivity first, and viral-minded pushes that elevate genre titles into broad-appeal conversations.

The landscape of horror in 2026

The genre has emerged as the steady counterweight in programming grids, a space that can break out when it hits and still safeguard the exposure when it does not. After 2023 reminded top brass that mid-range entries can shape the zeitgeist, 2024 kept energy high with festival-darling auteurs and surprise hits. The energy fed into the 2025 frame, where returns and premium-leaning entries proved there is capacity for diverse approaches, from sequel tracks to standalone ideas that perform internationally. The aggregate for 2026 is a grid that presents tight coordination across the field, with clear date clusters, a balance of brand names and fresh ideas, and a revived focus on exclusive windows that increase tail monetization on premium on-demand and digital services.

Distribution heads claim the category now acts as a flex slot on the slate. Horror can premiere on numerous frames, furnish a tight logline for spots and short-form placements, and lead with fans that line up on early shows and maintain momentum through the next pass if the picture fires. Exiting a production delay era, the 2026 setup telegraphs certainty in that approach. The calendar opens with a weighty January corridor, then taps spring and early summer for balance, while leaving room for a September to October window that reaches into the Halloween frame and into the next week. The program also illustrates the ongoing integration of boutique distributors and home platforms that can platform a title, grow buzz, and expand at the timely point.

A further high-level trend is brand curation across ongoing universes and established properties. The players are not just greenlighting another follow-up. They are trying to present ongoing narrative with a must-see charge, whether that is a logo package that flags a new vibe or a ensemble decision that links a incoming chapter to a early run. At the very same time, the writer-directors behind the top original plays are embracing in-camera technique, in-camera effects and vivid settings. That blend offers the 2026 slate a healthy mix of recognition and unexpected turns, which is what works overseas.

Studio by studio strategy signals

Paramount plants an early flag with two centerpiece bets that cover both tonal poles. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with original architect Kevin Williamson in the top job and Neve Campbell back at the front, presenting it as both a baton pass and a rootsy character-forward chapter. Filming is underway in Atlanta, and the creative posture indicates a heritage-honoring bent without retreading the last two entries’ sisters storyline. Plan for a rollout built on iconic art, first-look character reveals, and a staggered trailer plan timed to late fall. Distribution is Paramount’s cinema pipeline.

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 as creative contributors for the first time since the early 2000s, a hook the campaign will foreground. As a summer relief option, this one will seek large awareness through viral-minded bites, with the horror spoof format making room for quick reframes to whatever owns the meme cycle that spring.

Universal has three distinct lanes. SOULM8TE launches January 9, 2026, a tie-in spinoff from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The foundation is elegant, sorrow-tinged, and easily pitched: a grieving man activates an intelligent companion that unfolds into a dangerous lover. The date puts it at the front of a competition-heavy month, with marketing at Universal likely to bring back uncanny-valley stunts and short reels that blurs love and anxiety.

On May 8, 2026, the studio slots an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely considered the feature developed under working titles in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The dated slate currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which leaves room for a proper title to become an fan moment closer to the initial tease. The timing holds ground in early May while larger tentpoles circle other weekends.

Completing the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film claims October 23, 2026, a slot he has defined before. Peele projects are branded as filmmaker events, with a teaser that reveals little and a second wave of trailers that shape mood without giving away the concept. The pre-Halloween slot gives the studio room to maximize pre-holiday auditoriums with PLF and IMAX bookings where available, then activate the copyright window to capture late-October interest at home.

Warner Bros., via New Line, works with Sony internationally for Evil Dead Burn, dated July 24, 2026. Sébastien Vaniček commands, with Souheila Yacoub anchoring. The franchise has demonstrated that a blood-soaked, hands-on effects strategy can feel deluxe on a moderate cost. Position this as a red-band summer horror surge that leans hard into international play, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most world markets.

Sony’s horror bench is unusually deep. The studio books two franchise maneuvers in the back half. An untitled Insidious film lands August 21, 2026, keeping a consistent supernatural brand alive while the spin-off branch advances. The studio has moved dates on this title before, but the current plan sticks it in late summer, where the brand has traditionally delivered.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil steps back in what the studio is framing as a new foundation 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 well-defined brief to serve both longtime followers and newcomers. The fall slot lets Sony to build campaign pieces around universe detail, and creature design, elements that can drive premium screens and fan-forward engagement.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, pins a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Robert Eggers’ Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film carries forward Eggers’ run of period horror defined by textural authenticity and archaic language, this time set against lycan legends. Focus’s team has already announced the holiday for a holiday release, a promissory note in Eggers as a specialty play that can platform and widen if early reception is supportive.

SVOD and PVOD rhythms

Home-platform rhythms for 2026 run on well-known grooves. Universal’s genre entries land on copyright after a theatrical and PVOD run, a ordering that maximizes both debut momentum and subscriber lifts in the back half. Prime Video interleaves third-party pickups with global originals and targeted theatrical runs when the data backs it. Max and Hulu optimize their lanes in catalog engagement, using curated hubs, seasonal hubs, and featured rows to keep attention on the 2026 genre total. Netflix remains opportunistic about originals and festival buys, locking in horror entries closer to launch and turning into events drops with quick-run campaigns. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, deploys a two-step of targeted theatrical exposure 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 relying on genre pipelines in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ cherry-picks horror on a discrete basis. The platform has demonstrated openness to take on select projects with established auteurs or celebrity-led packages, then give them a boutique theatrical in partnership with exhibitors to meet guild rules or to build credibility before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney’s domestic pipeline still pulls from the 20th Century Studios slate, a key factor for platform stickiness when the genre conversation peaks.

Specialty and indie breakouts

Cineverse is steadily assembling a 2026 lane with two franchise steps. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The promise is clean: the same somber, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a beloved cult piece, retooled for modern sound and cinematography. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a late-year slot, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. The distributor has hinted a traditional cinema play for Legacy, an positive signal for fans of the hard-edged series and for exhibitors looking for R-rated counterplay in the autumn weeks.

Focus will push the auteur angle with Werwulf, stewarding the film through the fall circuit if the cut is ready, then working the year-end corridor to scale. That positioning has helped for prestige horror with four-quadrant hopes. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not dated many 2026 horror titles in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines often crystallize after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A credible outlook is a cluster of late-summer and fall platformers that can broaden if reception allows. Expect an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that screens at Cannes navigate to this website before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work hand in hand, using select theatrical to fuel evangelism that fuels their membership.

Franchise entries versus originals

By tilt, 2026 is weighted toward the IP side. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all draw on franchise value. The risk, as ever, is fatigue. The practical approach is to position each entry as a recast vibe. Paramount is bringing forward character and continuity in Scream 7, Sony is suggesting a clean restart for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is leading with a French-tinted vision from a new voice. Those choices register when the audience has so many options and social sentiment tilts quickly.

Originals and filmmaker-centric entries keep the lungs full. Jordan Peele’s October film will be positioned as a brand unto itself. Sam Raimi’s Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, puts Rachel McAdams into a survival chiller premise with Raimi’s impish dread. SOULM8TE offers a clear, chilling tech hook. Werwulf delivers period specificity and an uncompromising tone. Even when the title is not based on familiar IP, the configuration is grounded enough to accelerate early sales and Thursday-night turnout.

Rolling three-year comps outline the template. In 2023, a big-screen-first plan that kept streaming intact did not hamper a hybrid test from hitting when the brand was compelling. In 2024, craft-forward auteur horror popped in premium formats. In 2025, a return of a beloved infection saga underlined that global horror franchises can still feel fresh when they rotate perspective and stretch the story. That last point is directly relevant to Sony’s 28 Years Later plan, which carries on 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 lensed back-to-back, allows marketing to bridge entries through personae and themes and to hold creative in the market without long gaps.

How the films are being made

The shop talk behind the year’s horror foreshadow a continued lean toward tactile, place-driven craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not imitate any recent iteration of the property, a stance that aligns with the prosthetic-forward taste he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film wrapped production and is set for its April 17, 2026 date. Promo should that elevates texture and dread rather than theme-park spectacle, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership making room for financial discipline.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has described Werwulf as the most shadowed project he has tackled, which tracks with a feudal backdrop and archaic dialect, a combination that can make for 3D sound and a austere, elemental atmosphere on the big screen. Focus will likely frame this aesthetic in deep-dive features and technical spotlights before rolling out a tease that withholds plot, a move that has performed for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is tuned for tactile gnarliness, a signature of the series that lands overseas in red-band trailers and earns shareable jump-cut reactions from early screenings. Scream 7 offers a meta inflection that re-centers the original lead. Resident Evil will fly or stall on monster work and world-building, which align with convention activations and staggered reveals. Insidious tends to be a sonic showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the theatrical pitch feel must-have. Look for trailers that accent disciplined sound, deep-bass stingers, and mute beats that play in premium auditoriums.

How the year maps out

January is crowded. 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 atmospheric change-up amid heftier brand moves. The month closes with Send Help on January 30 via 20th Century Studios, a survival chiller from Sam Raimi that puts a star forward in Rachel McAdams. The competition here is credible, but the range of tones ensures lanes for each, and the five-week structure creates breathing room for each if word of mouth holds.

Q1 into Q2 seed summer. Scream 7 lands February 27 with nostalgia energy. In April, New Line’s The Mummy revives a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once suited genre counterprogramming and now sustains big openers. Universal’s untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 rolls into summer while maintaining horror’s hold on early May weekends that are not claimed by superheroes or family tentpoles.

Summer clarifies the lanes. Scary Movie 6 on June 12 is light and four-quadrant, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 drops severe intensity. The counterprogramming logic is workable. The spoof can connect next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest feeds older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have shuffled through big rooms.

Late-season stretch leans recognizable. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives Sony a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously performed. Resident Evil follows September 18, a late-September window that still connects to Halloween marketing beats. The Peele event grabs October 23 and will command cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely amplified by a slow-reveal plan and limited asset reveals that favor idea over plot.

Holiday corridor prestige. Werwulf on December 25 is a signal that genre can play the holidays when packaged as filmmaker-driven prestige horror. Focus has done this before, platforming with care, then capitalizing on critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to hold in chatter into January. If the film scores with critics, the studio can go wider in the first week of 2027 while riding holiday momentum and holiday gift-card burn.

Title snapshots

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting in progress as production pushes forward. Logline: Sidney returns to confront a new Ghostface while the narrative revisits the original film’s genome. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: heritage pivot with a current edge.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A devastated man’s algorithmic partner turns into something perilously amorous. Rating: TBA. Production: Principal is complete for an early-year bow. Positioning: silicon scare with soul.

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 opens the world beyond the immediate outbreak as a cult emerges in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Filmed consecutively with the first film. Positioning: prestige survival-horror continuation.

Return to Silent Hill (Cineverse, January 23, 2026)
Director: Christophe Gans. Top cast: TBA in updated campaign materials. Logline: A man travels back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to run into a shimmering reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Finished with U.S. theatrical locked. 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 tough boss push to survive on a desolate island as the hierarchy upends and dread encroaches. Rating: TBA. Production: Shoot complete. Positioning: marquee survival piece from a master.

The Mummy (New Line, April 17, 2026)
Director: Lee Cronin. Producers: Blumhouse, Atomic Monster, Doppelgängers. Top cast: roles under wraps in official materials. Logline: A fresh reimagining that returns the monster to fright, rooted in Cronin’s physical craft and creeping dread. Rating: TBA. Production: In the can. Positioning: monster revival with signature voice.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A family-home haunting piece that explores the fright of a child’s unreliable perspective. Rating: not yet rated. Production: post-ready. Positioning: studio-scale and marquee-led spirit-world 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 genre lampoon that teases today’s horror trends and true crime fascinations. Rating: pending. Production: principal photography set 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 surges, with an cross-border twist in tone and setting. Rating: pending. Production: lensing in New Zealand. Positioning: hard-hitting R entry designed for premium formats.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: TBD per campaign. Top cast: forthcoming. Logline: The Further stirs again, with a new family entangled with lingering terrors. Rating: not yet rated. Production: gearing up for summer filming with late-summer bow. Positioning: stalwart franchise piece in a friendly frame.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: forthcoming. Top cast: pending. Logline: A ground-up reset designed to re-engineer the franchise from the ground up, with an center of gravity in survival-driven horror over pyrotechnic spectacle. Rating: not yet rated. Production: in development with a locked date. Positioning: canon-conscious reboot with mainstream reach.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: unrevealed. Logline: closely held. Rating: TBA. Production: active. Positioning: filmmaker event, teaser-driven.

Werwulf (Focus Features, December 25, 2026)
Director: Robert Eggers. Top cast: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, with other regulars expected. Logline: A medieval werewolf story built on period language and raw menace. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: prepping toward a December 25 launch. Positioning: prestige horror for the holidays, with potential awards-season craft appeal.

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

Why the moment is 2026

Three practical forces inform this lineup. First, production that decelerated or recalendared in 2024 needed spacing on the calendar. Horror can occupy those holes swiftly because scripts often need fewer locations, fewer large-scale CGI sequences, and leaner 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 overdelivered vs. straight-to-streaming premieres. Third, social chatter converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will lean on shareable moments from test screenings, controlled scare clips synced to Thursday previews, and experiential pop-ups that serve as influencer content. It is a repeatable playbook because it holds up.

A fourth factor is programming math. Early-year family and superhero blocks are thinner in 2026, creating valuable space for genre entries that can own a weekend outright or position as the older-lean choice. January is the prime example. Four varied shades of horror will trade weekends 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 take advantage of a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Budgets and certifications, sleeper calculus

Budgets remain in the efficient band. Most of the films above will land under the $40–$50 million mark, with many far below. That allows for broad premium screen use 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 breakout hunt continues in Q1, where midrange-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 capitalize on those pockets. 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. Plan on a solid PVOD window generally, since horror fans have shown a willingness to pay for convenience after an opening weekend, especially when word of mouth is strong.

What the calendar feels like for audiences

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers cadence and diversity. January is a buffet, February delivers a legacy slasher, April brings back a Universal monster, May and June provide a two-hit supernatural combo for date nights and group outings, July gets blood-slick, August and September keep the supernatural momentum, October turns into a Jordan Peele event, and December invites a somber, literate nightmare. That is how you hold talk and turnout without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can escalate across the year, using earlier releases to seed the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

Exhibitors respond well to the spacing. Horror delivers steady Thursday pops, efficient placements, 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 visual texture, aural design, and picture 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

Slots move. Ratings change. Casts reconfigure. But the spine of 2026 horror is sturdy. There is brand power where it counts, inventive vision where it helps, 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 last-minute boutique pickup join the party. For now, the job is simple, craft precise trailers, hold the mystery, and let the fear sell the seats.