Age-old Dread surfaces: Andrew Chiaramonte’s Young & Cursed, a chilling horror thriller, debuting Oct 2025 across major platforms

A terrifying paranormal fear-driven tale from dramatist / movie maker Andrew Chiaramonte, awakening an primeval nightmare when foreigners become tokens in a supernatural contest. Available on October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime, Google’s YouTube, Google’s digital store, Apple’s iTunes, Apple’s TV+ service, and Fandango on-demand.

L.A., CA (August 8th, 2025) – get ready for *Young & Cursed*, a disturbing journey of living through and forgotten curse that will revolutionize the horror genre this October. Created by rising cinematic craftsman Andrew Chiaramonte, this nerve-racking and tone-heavy feature follows five individuals who wake up stranded in a off-grid shelter under the sinister manipulation of Kyra, a cursed figure occupied by a biblical-era sacrosanct terror. Arm yourself to be absorbed by a theatrical presentation that fuses visceral dread with biblical origins, coming on Prime Video, YouTube, Google Play, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango at Home on October 2, 2025.


Hellish influence has been a mainstay tradition in the entertainment world. In *Young & Cursed*, that belief is challenged when the dark entities no longer emerge outside the characters, but rather inside their minds. This suggests the grimmest corner of all involved. The result is a edge-of-seat inner struggle where the suspense becomes a unyielding battle between virtue and vice.


In a haunting landscape, five young people find themselves stuck under the dark dominion and haunting of a secretive character. As the team becomes paralyzed to oppose her manipulation, marooned and chased by evils indescribable, they are cornered to reckon with their emotional phantoms while the timeline ruthlessly draws closer toward their end.


In *Young & Cursed*, tension intensifies and ties fracture, driving each person to scrutinize their essence and the integrity of self-determination itself. The danger intensify with every short lapse, delivering a horror experience that harmonizes supernatural terror with inner turmoil.

Andrew Chiaramonte, Director: “With *Young & Cursed*, my goal was to draw upon deep fear, an presence before modern man, embedding itself in mental cracks, and exposing a evil that redefines identity when autonomy is removed.”

Madison Hubler (Kyra): “Portraying Kyra meant channeling something beneath mortal despair. She is ignorant until the curse activates, and that conversion is terrifying because it is so raw.”

Viewing Options

*Young & Cursed* will be launched for horror fans beginning October 2, 2025, on Amazon Prime, Google’s video hub, Google’s store, iTunes, Apple TV+, and Fandango on-demand—allowing fans everywhere can get immersed in this horror showcase.


Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has just uploaded a new official preview for *Young & Cursed*, up to watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/zu0n4WmPI1s, as a follow-through to its first trailer, which has pulled in over massive response.


In addition to its domestic release, Chiaramonte Films, Inc. has publicized that *Young & Cursed* will also be streamed globally, bringing the film to fans of fear everywhere.


Tune in for this unforgettable trip into the unknown. Confront *Young & Cursed* this spooky debut to explore these haunting secrets about the psyche.


For director insights, filmmaker commentary, and insider scoops from the creators, follow @YACMovie across platforms and visit youngandcursed.com.





Modern horror’s major pivot: calendar year 2025 stateside slate braids together ancient-possession motifs, signature indie scares, plus series shake-ups

Beginning with grit-forward survival fare inspired by mythic scripture all the way to returning series plus focused festival visions, 2025 stands to become the genre’s most multifaceted along with precision-timed year in ten years.

It is crowded, and also meticulously arranged. Top studios bookend the months with franchise anchors, simultaneously SVOD players front-load the fall with new voices and scriptural shivers. On the festival side, the micro-to-mid budget ranks is catching the backdraft of a record-setting 2024 festival season. Given Halloween is the centerpiece, the off-peak lanes are managed with purpose. A dense September through October runway is now a rite of passage, yet in 2025, players are marking January, spring, and mid-summer. Audiences are eager, studios are targeted, hence 2025 could stand as the most orchestrated year.

What Studios and Mini-Majors Are Doing: Premium genre swings back

Studios are not on the sidelines. If 2024 laid the groundwork for a horror reinvention, 2025 scales the plan.

Universal fires the first shot with a headline swing: a reinterpreted Wolf Man, not returning to the Gothic European hamlet, but a sharp contemporary setting. Shepherded by Leigh Whannell and starring Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner, this telling braids lycanthropy with a family meltdown. The transformation is not just physical, it is marital, parental, and painfully human. timed for mid January, it joins a broader aim to occupy winter’s quiet with elevated titles, not leftovers.

Spring delivers Clown in a Cornfield, a YA slasher adaptation reframed as lean dread. Directed by Eli Craig starring Katie Douglas opposite 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. Initial heat flags it as potent.

By late summer, Warner Bros. Pictures launches the swan song from its cornerstone horror IP: The Conjuring: Last Rites. The Warrens return, played by Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson, the installment promises emotional closure while taking on one of the duo’s most infamous real life cases. Despite a known recipe, director Michael Chaves is said to bring a more mournful, introspective tone to the series swan song. It sits in early September, securing daylight before October saturation.

Arriving later is The Black Phone 2. Set early then moved to October, a confidence tell. Scott Derrickson again directs, and the tone that worked before is intact: period tinged dread, trauma centered writing, plus uncanny supernatural grammar. The bar is raised this go, 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 title that can sell without classic marketing. The continuation widens the legend, expands its animatronic nightmare roster, courting teens and the thirty something base. It opens in December, securing the winter cap.

Digital Originals: Small budgets, sharp fangs

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

An especially bold streamer bet is Weapons, a long shadow anthology of dread braiding three timelines tied to a mass vanishing. Helmed by Zach Cregger with Josh Brolin opposite Julia Garner, the release pairs unease with narrative heft. Opening theatrically late summer ahead of fall SVOD, it will likely trigger thread wars and analysis videos, recalling Barbarian.

More contained by design is Together, a two hander body horror spiral anchored by Alison Brie and Dave Franco. Fixed in a remote let as a weekend curdles, the film explores what happens when love, envy, and self hatred merge into physical decay. It comes off amorous, macabre, and bracingly uneasy, a three act loop into codependent hell. Though no platform has officially staked a release date, it is a near certain autumn drop.

One more platform talker is Sinners, a 1930s period vampire folk story with Michael B. Jordan. Imaged in sepia bloom and biblical metaphor, it suggests There Will Be Blood blended with Let the Right One In. The film interrogates American religious trauma through supernatural allegory. First test passes flag it as highly discussable at debut.

More streamer bound indies stand by in the shadows: Bring Her Back, Bone Lake, and Keeper each engages grief, missing persons, and identity, with metaphor before show.

Possession With Depth: Young & Cursed

Hitting October 2 on the platforms, Young & Cursed emerges as a rare mix, tight in frame and epic in resonance. Conceived and directed 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. As the hours blacken, her hold tightens, an invasive current triggering fears, fissures, and regret.

The unease is psychological, fused to primal myth. Rather than another exorcism film centered on Catholic rites or Latin incantations, this story returns to something older, something darker. Lilith ignores rite, she wells up from trauma, quietude, and human weakness. By making possession inward rather than external, Young & Cursed joins a trend toward intimate character studies masked as genre.

Platforms such as Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play, and Fandango at Home position the film as a Halloween counter to sequel heavy theatricals and monster revivals. It is an astute call. No heavy handed lore. No legacy baggage. Straight psychological chill, boxed and tight, aimed at the binge, pause, and pulse habits of streamers. 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 has a thick horror program this time. Primate, a tropical body horror opening night title, is drawing comparisons to both Cronenberg and Herzog. Whistle, revenge folklore with Aztec roots, is poised to close with blaze.

Those midnight titles, including If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, buzz from delivery as much as naming. That one, an A24 backed satire on toxic fandom set during a horror convention lockdown, is poised for breakout status.

SXSW premiered Clown in a Cornfield and introduced several microbudget hauntings currently circling deals. Sundance tends to present grief infused elevated horror and likely will, while Tribeca’s genre section leans more urban, social, and surreal.

Festival playbooks now prize branding as much as discovery. The laurel is campaign ignition, not epilogue.

Legacy Horror: Additions, Do Overs, and Revisions

The legacy slate is stronger, and more deliberate, than in recent years.

Fear Street: Prom Queen, landing in July, re ups the 90s brand with a fresh lead and retro tone. Unlike prior entries, this one leans into camp and prom night melodrama. Picture tiaras, bright red goo, and VHS panic.

M3GAN 2.0 opens late June, and aims to widen its techno horror mythology with new characters and AI generated terrors. The opener’s social chatter and SVOD hours justify Universal’s deeper play.

The Long Walk, from an early and searing Stephen King work, is inbound, led by Francis Lawrence, it is a brutal dystopian allegory wrapped in survival horror, a kids walking until they die competition with no real winners. If framed properly, it could echo The Hunger Games for adult horror.

Other reboots and sequels, Hell House LLC: Lineage, V/H/S/Halloween, The Toxic Avenger, and Anaconda, are scattered across the calendar, most waiting for strategic windows or last minute acquisitions.

Emerging Currents

Ancient myth goes wide
From Lilith in Young & Cursed, and with Aztec curses in Whistle, horror taps ancient texts and symbols. This is less nostalgia, more reclamation of pre Christian archetypes. Horror pushes past jump scares, it points to ancient evil.

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

Streaming Originals Grow Teeth
The days of disposable horror filler on digital platforms are over. Streamers back real writing, real filmmakers, and genuine marketing. Titles such as Weapons and Sinners are treated as events, not mere content.

Festival Hype Equals Market Leverage
Festival laurels are no longer ornamental, they are leverage for theatrical release, premium placement, and media cycles. A film minus festival planning in 2025 risks getting lost.

Theatrical release is a trust fall
The big screen goes to those expected to beat comps or build series. Everything else is PVOD or hybrid. Horror continues in theaters, in narrower curated lanes.

Projection: Fall crush plus winter X factor

Put Young & Cursed, The Conjuring: Last Rites, The Black Phone 2, and Weapons into September and October and you get saturation. Indies such as Bone Lake and Keeper must fight for oxygen. Anticipate possible date slides into early 2026 or platform moves.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 locks December, while a late surprise on a platform remains possible. With some of the year’s biggest films leaning dark and mythic, the space for one final creature feature or exorcism flick is wide open.

The 2025 performance is about reach across segments, not one hero title. The goal is not Get Out again, it is horror with staying power past opening weekends.



The coming 2026 genre lineup: returning titles, standalone ideas, plus A loaded Calendar engineered for Scares

Dek: The current genre calendar stacks from day one with a January cluster, from there unfolds through peak season, and well into the winter holidays, fusing IP strength, untold stories, and smart offsets. Distributors with platforms are doubling down on tight budgets, theatrical leads, and social-fueled campaigns that convert horror entries into all-audience topics.

Horror’s position as 2026 begins

The horror sector has established itself as the surest option in studio calendars, a segment that can scale when it clicks and still limit the risk when it doesn’t. After the 2023 year reconfirmed for greenlighters that responsibly budgeted scare machines can drive the national conversation, the following year maintained heat with auteur-driven buzzy films and slow-burn breakouts. The carry fed into the 2025 frame, where reboots and prestige plays underscored there is an opening for a variety of tones, from continued chapters to filmmaker-driven originals that resonate abroad. The sum for the 2026 slate is a run that feels more orchestrated than usual across players, with intentional bunching, a combination of established brands and new pitches, and a revived attention on exclusive windows that boost PVOD and platform value on premium digital rental and subscription services.

Schedulers say the genre now functions as a schedule utility on the rollout map. Horror can roll out on numerous frames, supply a clear pitch for trailers and platform-native cuts, and punch above weight with audiences that lean in on advance nights and keep coming through the next pass if the film satisfies. Emerging from a strike-driven backlog, the 2026 cadence demonstrates conviction in that logic. The slate begins with a front-loaded January stretch, then targets spring into early summer for counterprogramming, while making space for a autumn push that connects to late October and into post-Halloween. The gridline also highlights the expanded integration of specialized imprints and streamers that can launch in limited release, spark evangelism, and expand at the optimal moment.

Another broad trend is brand management across brand ecosystems and veteran brands. Big banners are not just producing another entry. They are working to present connection with a heightened moment, whether that is a art treatment that telegraphs a new vibe or a ensemble decision that reconnects a next entry to a classic era. At the concurrently, the filmmakers behind the high-profile originals are leaning into in-camera technique, in-camera effects and site-specific worlds. That interplay hands 2026 a lively combination of known notes and invention, which is the formula for international play.

Studio by studio strategy signals

Paramount defines the early cadence with two prominent plays that bookend the tonal range. First comes Scream 7 on February 27, 2026, with original architect Kevin Williamson in the director role and Neve Campbell back at the focus, marketing it as both a cross-generational handoff and a origin-leaning character-forward chapter. Principal photography is underway in Atlanta, and the directional approach signals a roots-evoking treatment without retreading the last two entries’ sibling arc. Watch for a push centered on recognizable motifs, character-first teases, and a trailer cadence hitting late fall. Distribution is big-screen via Paramount.

Paramount also resurrects a once-mighty spoof franchise with Scary Movie 6 on June 12, 2026, directed by Michael Tiddes. Anna Faris and Regina Hall are re-teaming, with the Wayans brothers involved as creative voices for the first time since the early 2000s, a hook the campaign will spotlight. As a summer relief option, this one will drive broad awareness through meme-friendly cuts, with the horror spoof format inviting quick switches to whatever tops the conversation that spring.

Universal has three distinct lanes. SOULM8TE arrives January 9, 2026, a technology-driven offshoot from the M3GAN universe from Atomic Monster and Blumhouse. The core idea is tidy, somber, and big-hook: a grieving man brings home an digital partner that grows into a killer companion. The date nudges it to the front of a front-loaded month, with Universal’s campaign likely to replay off-kilter promo beats and short reels that threads affection and creep.

On May 8, 2026, the studio sets an untitled Rob Savage horror film, widely taken to be the feature developed under code names in the family-in-peril vein, with Jessica Chastain top-lining. The official release calendar currently lists it as an untitled Savage project, which creates space for a public title to become an event moment closer to the first look. The timing gives the studio a foothold in early May while larger tentpoles stack elsewhere.

Supplementing the studio’s year, Jordan Peele’s untitled event film plants on October 23, 2026, a slot he has made his own before. Peele titles are branded as must-see filmmaker statements, with Check This Out a hinting teaser and a second beat that prime atmosphere without details the concept. The Halloween runway affords Universal to dominate 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 steers, with Souheila Yacoub starring. The franchise has consistently shown that a in-your-face, practical-effects forward mix can feel deluxe on a lean spend. Look for a viscera-heavy summer horror jolt that spotlights global traction, with Warner Bros. handling U.S. and Sony taking most global territories.

Sony’s horror bench is surprisingly deep. The studio lines up two brand-forward plays in the back half. An untitled Insidious film arrives August 21, 2026, preserving a bankable supernatural brand in play while the spin-off branch incubates. Sony has shifted dates on this title before, but the current plan sticks it in late summer, where the brand has long performed.

Then, on September 18, 2026, Resident Evil restarts in what the studio is billing as a from-the-ground-up reboot for its game-to-film powerhouse. With the PlayStation Productions pipeline now a strategic part of the studio’s strategy, this new take has a sharper mandate to serve both players and curious audiences. The fall slot affords Sony time to build artifacts around narrative world, and practical creature work, elements that can accelerate premium format interest and community activity.

Focus Features, working with Working Title, books a prestige bet on Christmas Day with Werwulf on December 25, 2026. Set in 13th-century England, the film maintains Eggers’ run of period horror shaped by careful craft and archaic language, this time exploring werewolf lore. Focus has already announced the holiday for a holiday release, a confidence marker in the auteur as a specialty play that can scale widely if early reception is positive.

SVOD and PVOD rhythms

Home-platform rhythms for 2026 run on tested paths. Universal’s genre slate head to copyright after a big-screen and PVOD window, a tiered path that enhances both initial urgency and subscriber lifts in the post-theatrical. Prime Video balances library titles with cross-border buys and qualifying theatrical engagements when the data signals it. Max and Hulu focus their lanes in catalog discovery, using editorial spots, seasonal hubs, and curated strips to prolong the run on the annual genre haul. Netflix retains agility about internal projects and festival acquisitions, securing horror entries tight to release and elevating as drops drops with fast-turn plans. Shudder, integrated with RLJE and Cineverse’s theatrical footprint, operates a laddered of selective theatrical runs and speedy platforming that turns chatter to conversion. That will matter for Return to Silent Hill, which Cineverse is releasing in theaters January 23, 2026, before turning to fan pipelines in the months that follow.

Apple TV+ treats carefully horror on a bespoke basis. The platform has shown a willingness to acquire select projects with recognized filmmakers or celebrity-led packages, then give them a limited theatrical run in partnership with exhibitors to meet awards eligibility or to earn receipts before the streaming drop. Hulu and Disney domestic still benefits from the 20th Century Studios slate, a meaningful lever for month-over-month retention when the genre conversation peaks.

Art-house genre prospects

Cineverse is engineering a 2026 lane with two brand extensions. Return to Silent Hill lands in January with Christophe Gans returning to his adaptation of Konami’s classic title. The proposition is tight: the same moody, fog-choked atmosphere that made the original a beloved cult piece, recalibrated for modern soundscapes and visuals. Later in the year, Wolf Creek: Legacy is expected in a autumn slot, with Greg McLean back steering his outback slasher universe. Cineverse has signaled a big-screen first plan for the title, an positive signal for fans of the nasty series and for exhibitors needing R-rated alternatives in the autumn weeks.

Focus will play the auteur card with Werwulf, escorting the title through the fall circuit if the cut is ready, then working the holiday frame to broaden. That positioning has been successful for director-led genre with mainstream crossovers. A24, NEON, IFC Films, RLJE, and Magnet have not released many dates in public calendars yet, but their festival pipelines often crystallize after Sundance, Berlin, and Cannes. A plausible forecast is a handful of late-summer and fall platformers that can expand if reception supports. Be ready for an A24 acquisition out of Sundance midnight slots and a NEON title that debuts at Cannes before a September or October domestic bow. RLJE and Shudder often work in parallel, using select theatrical to jump-start evangelism that fuels their audience.

Franchises versus originals

By weight, 2026 leans in favor of the legacy column. Scream 7, Insidious, Resident Evil, Evil Dead Burn, and Return to Silent Hill all use marquee value. The challenge, as ever, is audience fatigue. The pragmatic answer is to position each entry as a fresh tone. Paramount is leading with relationship and legacy in Scream 7, Sony is hinting at a new foundation for Resident Evil, and New Line’s Evil Dead Burn is driving a continental coloration from a emerging director. Those choices prove meaningful when the audience has so many options and social sentiment spins fast.

Originals and director-driven titles supply the oxygen. Jordan Peele’s October film will be branded as a brand unto itself. Send Help, dated January 30, 2026 at 20th Century Studios, puts Rachel McAdams in a survival-thriller premise with the filmmaker’s mischievous menace. SOULM8TE offers a clear, chilling tech hook. Werwulf grounds itself in period and an severe tone. Even when the title is not based on legacy IP, the team and cast is grounded enough to build pre-sales and advance-audience nights.

Rolling three-year comps make sense of the template. In 2023, a theater-first model that preserved streaming windows did not deter a hybrid test from performing when the brand was big. In 2024, director-craft horror surged in premium auditoriums. In 2025, a reanimation of a beloved infection saga made clear that global horror franchises can still feel fresh when they reframe POV and widen scale. 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 back-to-back plan, with chapters filmed consecutively, permits marketing to cross-link entries through personae and themes and to leave creative active without lulls.

Production craft signals

The creative meetings behind this slate point to a continued turn toward real, location-led craft. Lee Cronin has said his The Mummy will not echo any recent iteration of the property, a stance that matches the hands-on effects stance he brought to Evil Dead Rise. The film finished filming and is lined up for its April 17, 2026 date. Plan for a push that elevates creep and texture rather than roller-coaster spectacle, with the New Line and Blumhouse partnership enabling cost management.

Robert Eggers, meanwhile, has framed Werwulf as the darkest project he has tackled, which tracks with a Middle Ages setting and era-true language, a combination that can make for enveloping sound design and a icy, primal tone on the big screen. Focus will likely warm the market to this aesthetic in long-lead features and craft spotlights before rolling out a preview that centers atmosphere over story, a move that has performed for the filmmaker’s past releases.

On the franchise side, Evil Dead Burn is built for tactile gnarliness, a signature of the series that connects worldwide in red-band trailers and generates shareable screening reactions from early screenings. Scream 7 delivers a meta-horror reset that brings back the core lead. Resident Evil will win or lose on monster aesthetics and world-building, which fit with expo activations and managed asset releases. Insidious tends to be a sonic showcase, with Dolby and Atmos spots that make the cinema value feel necessary. Look for trailers that highlight precise sound design, deep-bass stingers, and quiet voids that sing on PLF.

Month-by-month map

January is stacked. 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 quiet contrast amid marquee brands. The month buttons with Send Help on January 30 via 20th Century Studios, a survival shocker from Sam Raimi that puts a star forward in Rachel McAdams. The competition here is formidable, but the tone spread makes lanes for each, and the five-week structure allows a clean run for each if word of mouth sticks.

Late Q1 and spring load in summer. Scream 7 arrives February 27 with fan warmth. In April, New Line’s The Mummy restores a classic monster on April 17, a spring frame that once suited genre counterprogramming and now can handle big openers. Universal’s untitled Rob Savage film on May 8 feeds 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 jokier and broader, then Evil Dead Burn on July 24 brings red-band intensity. The counterprogramming logic is sound. The spoof can connect next to family tentpoles and animated films, while the mid-summer gorefest scratches the itch for older teenagers and genre diehards once the big Friday sequels have run their PLF course.

End of summer through fall leans franchise. The Insidious entry on August 21 gives the studio a spiritual-horror anchor where the brand has previously landed. Resident Evil steps in after September 18, a early fall window that still connects to Halloween marketing beats. Jordan Peele’s untitled film grabs October 23 and will own cultural oxygen heading into Halloween weekend, likely supported by a peekaboo tease plan and limited pre-release reveals that trade in concept over detail.

December specialty. Werwulf on December 25 is a line in sand that genre can play the holidays when packaged as awards-flirting horror. Focus has done this before, measured platforming, then capitalizing on critics’ lists and awards-season craft coverage to extend talk into January. If the film wins with critics, the studio can broaden in the first week of 2027 while carrying holiday turnout and card redemption.

One-sentence dossiers

Scream 7 (Paramount, February 27, 2026)
Director: Kevin Williamson. Top cast: Neve Campbell, with casting ongoing as production advances. Logline: Sidney returns to take on a new Ghostface while the narrative rethreads the original film’s DNA. Rating: TBA. Production: Filming in Atlanta. Positioning: return-to-core with a fresh edge.

SOULM8TE (Universal, January 9, 2026)
Producers: Atomic Monster, Blumhouse. Logline: A mourning man’s virtual companion unfolds into something dangerously intimate. Rating: TBA. Production: Photography 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 ascends in the ruins. Rating: TBA. Production: Filmed consecutively with the first film. Positioning: next step of a prestige infection saga.

Return to Silent Hill (Cineverse, January 23, 2026)
Director: Christophe Gans. Top cast: TBA in updated campaign materials. Logline: A man heads back to a fog-shrouded town in search of a lost love, only to confront a altering reality and the town’s horrors. Rating: TBA. Production: Done with U.S. run set. Positioning: fog-and-fear 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 unyielding boss battle to survive on a uninhabited island as the pecking order upends and paranoia builds. Rating: TBA. Production: Wrapped. 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 contemporary retelling that returns the monster to chill, based on Cronin’s physical craft and rising dread. Rating: TBA. Production: Wrapped. Positioning: legacy monster restart with director stamp.


Untitled Rob Savage Horror Film (Universal, May 8, 2026)
Director: Rob Savage. Top cast: Jessica Chastain. Logline: {A home-set haunting premise that interrogates the unease of a child’s uncertain read. Rating: pending. Production: fully shot. Positioning: studio-scale and name-above-title paranormal suspense.

Scary Movie 6 (Paramount, June 12, 2026)
Director: Michael Tiddes. Top cast: Anna Faris, Regina Hall, with the Wayans brothers back in creative roles. Logline: {A parody return that lampoons current genre trends and true-crime manias. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: lensing scheduled 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 worldly twist in tone and setting. Rating: pending. Production: currently in New Zealand. Positioning: R-rated franchise charge tuned for PLF.

Untitled Insidious Film (Sony, August 21, 2026)
Director: TBD per campaign. Top cast: to be announced. Logline: The Further yawns again, with a fresh family tethered to older hauntings. Rating: undetermined. Production: set for summer production targeting late-summer opening. Positioning: steady supernatural brand in a historically strong slot.

Resident Evil (Sony, September 18, 2026)
Director: unrevealed publicly. Top cast: TBA. Logline: A fresh restart designed to re-establish the franchise from the ground up, with an preference for survival-first horror over action spectacle. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: moving through development on a locked slot. Positioning: game-faithful modern reboot with crossover potential.

Jordan Peele Untitled Event Film (Universal, October 23, 2026)
Director: Jordan Peele. Top cast: pending. Logline: tightly guarded. Rating: TBA. Production: underway. Positioning: director-fronted event with teaser rhythm.

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 time-true diction and bone-deep menace. Rating: awaiting classification. Production: in active prep with holiday date set. Positioning: specialty holiday horror poised for crafts recognition.

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 shifting, fall likely.

Why the 2026 timing works

Three practical forces organize this lineup. First, production that downshifted or reshuffled in 2024 required schedule breathing room. Horror can patch those gaps promptly because scripts often call for fewer locales, fewer large-scale effects sequences, and shorter schedules. 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 out-earned straight-to-streaming launches. Third, social chatter converts. The marketing teams behind these titles will mine bite-size scare clips from test screenings, select scare clips calibrated to Thursday preview timing, and experiential pop-ups that feed creator content. It is a repeatable playbook because it converts.

A fourth element is the programming calculus. Early-2026 family and superhero concentrations ease, leaving useful real estate for genre entries that can seize a weekend or act as the older-tilt option. January is the prime example. Four genre tones will stack across five weekends, which lets WOM accrue cleanly. Summer provides the other window. The spoof can draft behind animation and action in early summer, then the hard-R entry can take advantage of a late-July lull before back-to-school.

Business view: budgets, ratings, sleeper chase

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

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

Internationally, brand recognition helps Resident Evil, Evil Dead, and Scream travel, while 28 Years Later benefits from a British setting and returning talent. Werwulf and The Mummy will lean on auteur and classic-monster awareness abroad. Streamers will amplify the tail, with copyright pickups boosting Universal’s slate and Shudder driving evangelism for Cineverse titles. 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.

How the year flows for audiences

From a moviegoer’s perspective, the 2026 horror year offers cadence and diversity. January is a sampler, February delivers a legacy slasher, April brings back a Universal monster, May and June provide a one-two spectral pairing 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 cold, literate nightmare. That is how you keep chatter alive and occupancy strong without cannibalizing your own titles. The pattern also supports social campaigns that can ratchet upward, using earlier releases to prep the audience for bigger plays in the fall.

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

Release dates move. Ratings change. Casts reconfigure. But the spine of 2026 horror is intact. There is IP strength where it matters, distinct vision where it matters, 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 late-arriving specialty entry join the party. For now, the job is simple, deliver taut trailers, protect the mystery, and let the chills sell the seats.