ScreamWire Daily

$20.2M four-day launch for The Amazing Digital Circus: The Last Act turned Fathom’s 2,221-theater event into a surprise theatrical win; spoiler-driven demand pushed the YouTube horror-adjacent finale from a 500-screen plan to a global rollout.

Imagine Entertainment boarded Whalefall in August 2023 after Brian Duffield DM’d Daniel Kraus for the rights; Duffield adapted the novel, shot much of the film inside a whale-stomach set at Radford Studios, and 20th Century is keeping it on an Oct. 16 theatrical path.

Mike Flanagan has wrapped principal photography on Universal and Blumhouse’s new Exorcist film after roughly three months, with the franchise’s roughly $400 million rights play now moving toward a March 12, 2027 release. Scarlett Johansson, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Diane Lane lead a stacked ensemble that includes multiple Flanagan regulars.

Sebastián De Caro has optioned Argentine spin-off rights to Joe Begos’ Jimmy and Stiggs; the first international expansion from Eli Roth’s The Horror Section closed at the Cannes Marché du Film IP showcase.

Backrooms has pushed A24 past the $200 million mark for the first time, with the horror breakout hitting $213 million worldwide in week two. The $10 million film posted an $81 million opening and makes Kane Parsons the youngest director ever to top the box office.

$17M in box-office bonuses is flowing to Jason Blum’s Blumhouse Atomic off Focus’ $15M TIFF buy of Curry Barker’s $750K horror breakout, which has now topped $229M worldwide.

Ash is staying off the board; Campbell says Evil Dead is shifting into standalone nightmares after Evil Dead Rise’s $147M worldwide run, with Evil Dead Burn set for 2027 and Evil Dead Wrath dated for 2028.

$229.3M worldwide and still rising as Focus Features’ Obsession keeps overperforming on a $750K budget. Focus paid $15M-plus out of TIFF; the horror romance is now closing on Blair Witch Project as the biggest festival acquisition ever at the global box office.

Bleecker Street picks up Anton Corbijn’s Patricia Highsmith thriller ‘A Talent For Murder’ for fall 2026; Helen Mirren leads with Olivia Cooke and Alden Ehrenreich, marking Corbijn’s first narrative feature in 11 years.

Stephen Graham Jones’ The Buffalo Hunter Hunter wins Novel; Ryan Coogler’s Sinners takes screenplay, with Warner Bros. and Zach Cregger’s Weapons also among the night’s horror standouts.

Broadway closes Jan. 3, 2027 and the West End wraps Dec. 27, 2026 after a $20M+ staging that has not recouped; the play grossed $859,339 last week at 74% capacity. Nearly 1.6 million tickets have been sold across both runs.

WME signs Dónal Finn as the Irish actor rides a breakout turn as Moriarty in Amazon's Young Sherlock; his resume also includes The Wheel of Time, The Witcher and Cursed.

Anggy Umbara’s Indonesian remake of Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum has landed a first-look image and heads to the 30th Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival as Korean Haunted Hospital, with local release under 402: Rumah Sakit Angker Korea. An English-language remake is also in development.

Rupert Everett has boarded ABC’s six-part Fortitude Valley as DCD Rights takes world sales; the Brisbane-set crime thriller is heading to MIPCOM with Screen Australia, ABC and Screen Queensland money behind it.

BIFAN is using its 30th edition to push AI and XR hard: 321 titles from 50 countries, 38 AI-made works, 28 XR projects and a new Bucheon AI Content Summit built around training, screenings and business meetings. The fest also folds in a refreshed competition structure, a 33-title Asian genre survey and marquee programming from Kiyoshi Kurosawa and Joko Anwar.

Apex is at 117M Netflix views in 38 days and still tracking toward War Machine territory; the run reinforces the streamer’s appetite for star-driven survival thrillers with a clean global hook.

Fredrik S. Hana’s new short MANCAVE will world premiere at BIFAN, with a trailer now online; Charlotte Husebø stars as a woman pulled into repressed fantasies and dark secrets after finding a hidden room in her husband Didrik Husebø’s garage.

Financiers rolled money from a shelved project into Act One; Sophia Takal’s teen-actress thriller bows at Tribeca with Ella Beatty, Ari Graynor and Nate Mann attached.

StudioCanal rolls out Michael Mann’s 4K Final Cut of Manhunter after Academy Museum and Il Cinema Ritrovato premieres; the July 24 theatrical rerelease reframes the Thomas Harris adaptation as a prestige catalog play.

Hammerstone Studios has financed Little One; Amy Smart, Chiara Aurelia, Redding Munsell, and Derek Luh join David Harbour and Gaby Hoffmann as Alex Kavutskiy’s feature begins shooting in Los Angeles this month.

Netflix has rounded out Scooby-Doo: Origins as the reboot continues shooting in Atlanta; the modern supernatural reimagining adds Sara Gilbert, Bruce McGill, Rusty Schwimmer and others, with Paul Walter Hauser in a secret role.

Chris Reinacher boards Curry Barker’s Anything But Ghosts, the Focus/Blumhouse-Atomic Monster follow-up to Obsession; the cast already includes Barker, Aaron Paul, Bryce Dallas Howard, Violet McGraw, and Cooper Tomlinson.

Viva Pictures has taken North American theatrical rights to Pinocchio Unstrung for a July 24, 2026 release; ITN Distribution is handling home video and streaming rights as the Twisted Child Universe slasher stacks festival heat from Brussels Fantastic and Raindance.

Joe Bob Briggs is writing the introduction to Stephen King and Ben Percy’s new book, adding the horror host’s name to the collaboration between the two authors.