ScreamWire Daily

Paramount revives a horror classic under its new genre push; the Freddy Krueger franchise is back in active development for a fresh feature launch.

Vertigo Releasing has landed UK-Ireland rights to Taratoa Stappard’s Māori gothic horror Mārama from MPI Media Group; an autumn theatrical release follows a festival run through Toronto, Fantastic Fest and Sitges.

Frontières' 2026 co-production market hits a record 136 feature submissions and 58 shorts-to-features entries as Fantasia expands its genre-financing footprint. Lineup highlights include Thai folk horror Cher, zombie comedy Cold Feet, psych thriller Third Wheel and Filipino vampire project My Missing Half, with multiple titles already carrying awards or sales momentum.

A24 pushes Backrooms to digital sales and rentals on July 14, cutting a 46-day theatrical window after the film became the studio's biggest domestic and global hit. Kane Parsons' breakout has already topped $361M worldwide and further validated the YouTube-to-genre pipeline.

French companies SCoT(T) and The Project are boarding Gro(ceries) as the horror-comedy heads into Frontières, strengthening the U.K. package ahead of a Q1 2027 shoot. The team is already in early talks on casting, finance, sales and distribution.

Alief boards world sales on psychological horror Godhead ahead of its Fantasia premiere; Mark H. Rapaport's sophomore feature stars Al Warren, Sarah Coffey, Kimball Farley and Luke Speakman, with Kinematics and Free & Clear among producers.

Digital retail drops August 1, months before subscription streaming, as Blumhouse Atomic Monster and Universal window SOULM8TE out of the M3GAN universe with Kate Dolan at the helm.

Lee Cronin's The Mummy is out on 4K UHD through Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment; the body-horror reboot has already banked $90.6 million worldwide on a $22 million budget and is now profitable theatrically.

Lionsgate Limited is rolling out The Descent: Part 2 on U.S. 4K for the first time on Aug. 11, with Blu-ray, digital and steelbook editions plus legacy extras for the franchise title.

Keith Carradine boards J.J. Abrams-produced creature feature Skeletons, joining Brie Larson in a modern creature-horror take told through a young boy’s discovery.

“The Long Walk” opened at No. 1 on HBO Max’s U.S. chart, giving Lionsgate’s Stephen King adaptation a strong streaming second life after theaters. The $20 million production has topped $63 million worldwide, with an 88% critics score and 85% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Altitude lines up Pinocchio: Unstrung for UK cinemas July 24 after its Raindance premiere; Rhys Frake-Waterfield’s Twisted Childhood Universe entry casts Robert Englund and Richard Brake in a grisly Pinocchio rework.

Fantasia world premiere frames Rubberhead as a biopic on effects legend Steve Johnson; Nick Taylor says the doc tracks the monster maker’s career through archival footage rather than fan-service.

Jeff Barker’s psychological horror short Medium Rare starts production in Los Angeles later this summer, with Dane Cook and Lesley Ann Warren starring. LD Entertainment’s Mehrodod Heydari, Mammoth Pictures and World’s Fair Pictures are among the producers.

Fort Solis is moving from game to feature as a sci-fi horror adaptation; the project is now on the board with no buyer or cast attached yet.

Channel 4’s six-part authoritarian-Britain thriller has set Paddy Considine, America Ferrera, Alex Hassell and Kit Harington and has started filming across Manchester, Liverpool, London and Paris. Studiocanal and Two Cities Television are co-producing, with Studiocanal handling international sales.

SkyShowtime has a six-episode Spanish true-crime limited series in production, adapting the podcast The Two Deaths of Javier Ardines with Javier Gutiérrez, María Vázquez and Isak Férriz aboard; K 2000 and 100 Balas produce.

A24’s Onslaught has landed an R from the MPA for strong bloody violence, gore, sexual material, nudity and language ahead of its Sept. 4 theatrical release, locking in the movie’s hard-R horror positioning.

AMC+ sets The Vampire Lestat: One Night Only LIVE for streaming on Aug. 23, extending the Anne Rice franchise with companion concert content after the Beacon Theatre performance.

LA Shorts International Film Festival slots Christopher Piñero’s psychological horror short after Panic Fest and Chattanooga; Aaron Dominguez headlines the Puerto Rican filmmaker’s survival-paranoia piece.

Simple Town's Fantasia-bound Big Break blends meta horror comedy with a killer-in-the-woods premise; the sketch group stars as fictionalized versions of themselves in a feature about career jealousy, reunion pressure and ambition gone feral.

Horror Island and Scream Queer ink a Dagon Films partnership that can funnel standout 2026 selections into collector’s Blu-ray releases, extending festival titles into physical distribution and cult-genre retail beyond the circuit.

570,000 advance tickets and a 67.1% reservation rate put Na Hong-jin's HOPE atop Korea's 2026 release slate; the Cannes competition title is turning an SF/action play into a tentpole-style domestic launch.

CapCut and Moonmax commission 10 AI-native shorts for Raindance, with each film conceived, built and finished inside CapCut Video Studio; the project is a clean read on AI tooling moving into festival-backed production.

Cleopatra Venom sets The Behemoth for digital video and DVD on Aug. 25; the supernatural cult horror follows a mountain-village couple trapped in a ritual that wakes an ancient entity.

Adam Scott, Severance writers Ezra Claytan Daniels and Eli Jorné are developing Shifter, a Hulu sci-fi series based on Koren Shadmi’s Hachette graphic novel; Daniels and Jorné will write, with Scott, Naomi Scott and Cotter exec producing.

Well Go USA is rolling Train to Busan back into U.S. and Canadian theaters on Aug. 14 in 4K for its 10th anniversary. The re-release is timed alongside Yeon Sang-ho’s new zombie film Colony, which opens Aug. 28.

Warner Bros. locks Chris Ferguson’s Oddfellows into a first-look pact for Clockwork, pairing the Vancouver shop with WB Pictures and New Line on modestly budgeted theatrical plays. The producer’s horror track record includes Longlegs, The Monkey and Backrooms, which topped well over $375M worldwide.

Italian horror-thriller Ferine is set for its international premiere at Fantasia on July 22; Andrea Corsini’s feature debut stars Carolyn Bracken and Caroline Goodall. The project came through Frontières development channels in Cannes and Montreal before landing its festival bow.

Locarno books the world premiere for Rebekah McKendry’s vampire revenge pic Sundown; Olwen Fouéré and Carolyn Bracken headline the family-blood-feud horror feature.