Netflix, A24 & Roy Lee

Zach Shields now scripts Gladys; Zach Cregger has stepped off the prequel screenplay but stays on as producer with Vertigo Entertainment’s Roy Lee and Miri Yoon. Warner Bros. has already locked the Weapons offshoot for a Sept. 8, 2028 theatrical release with Amy Madigan back as Aunt Gladys.

A24 locks Kane Parsons to direct Backrooms 2, keeping the teen analog-horror filmmaker inside the franchise after the first film turned the YouTube mythos into a breakout theatrical hit. Parsons is officially signed; the sequel announcement is imminent.

Barunson E&A and GDH559 have sold Inherit across Japan, Korea, Southeast Asia, Latin America and Poland ahead of its Toronto Centrepiece premiere; the Thai horror thriller rolls into Busan next and opens locally Nov. 19.

$5,745,284 second weekend; BUDDY is up 5 percent to a $14,262,585 cume, setting Roadside Attractions and Saban Films records as the year’s top indie R-rated opener under 1,800 screens.

Warner Bros. lands Siren Head after a five-studio bidding war; Brian Duffield directs and co-writes with Zach Cregger, with Trevor Henderson executive producing. Roy Lee, Andrew Childs and Scott Glassgold are aboard on the feature adaptation of the viral creature.

IDR20 billion ($1.13 million) annual Indonesian co-production fund will back up to 10 projects a year; Toho opens a French branch after its Anime Ltd. acquisition, and Cinépolis / Unifrance are taking Tour de Cine Francés-style distribution to India, Indonesia, Spain and Chile from 2027.

Metis Films takes UK-Ireland rights to Sundance prizewinner Lady from Hanway Films; the UK-Nigeria co-production is targeting a 2027 theatrical rollout, backed by Film4, BFI, Screen Scotland, Level Forward and Amplify Capital.

Netflix is back on Dept. Q with season 2 and a new cast wave after the crime thriller spent six weeks in the streamer’s global top 10. Matthew Goode returns as Carl Morck, with new additions including James Corden, Aisling Franciosi, Greg Wise and Tony Curran.

Spider-Man: Brand New Day cleared $1 billion in five days; The Odyssey and Universal's Michael also joined the club, with Michael becoming Lionsgate's first $1 billion title and the highest-grossing biopic ever.

Sony’s Insidious: Out Of The Further added £757,000 in the UK-Ireland for £6.5m total; the horror sequel held third as holdovers kept the market soft.

Danish thriller The Secret Woman is climbing Netflix's global chart after its Aug. 28 debut; FlixPatrol ranks it behind only The Whisper Man, giving Netflix another imported suspense hit.

Vedd Rawtaani’s horror short lands a Super Six screening at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival after stops at Panic Fest, HARD International Film Festival and Marché du Film; Bharat International Film Festival is curating the Venice presentation for Sept. 8, 2026.

Sitges rolls out Panorama, Midnight X-treme and Brigadoon titles for its 59th edition; Bárbara Rey lands the Nosferatu honor, while the lineup leans into family-trauma horror, supernatural threat and cult-fantastic fare.

Studio TF1’s Leon Marchand doc set a France TV documentary record with 2.3 million average views per episode on france.tv and 13 million-plus social views; Surface has since sold across the U.S. and Europe, with MHz Choice, the BBC, AMC Global Media and Moment aboard.

43M viewing hours after launch, a No. 1 run on Hulu and Disney+, and an early Season 2 renewal have turned Furious into a streaming breakout.

France TV Distribution is taking four TV movies to Unifrance Rendez-Vous in Le Havre, led by the female-fronted action thrillers Alma and The Recruit; the slate is being shopped alongside crime and dramedy titles to buyers at market.

Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey has crossed 10 million admissions, becoming the first foreign film in four years to hit that mark. The milestone underlines the film’s box-office reach in Korea as its distributor continues to ride the local theatrical surge.

Netflix keeps Richard Osman’s murder-mystery brand in development; We Solve Murders is moving as a series with the streamer after Netflix already picked up the rights to the novel. Osman also has We Chase Shadows queued up, keeping the property in active franchise mode.

Netflix India sets Sept. 24 for Shaque: Trust No One; Rensil D'Silva directs the mystery-thriller with Parineeti Chopra leading an ensemble that includes Jennifer Winget and Tahir Raj Bhasin.

Roughly 30 seconds of generative AI footage shows up in Danny Boyle's 'Ink'; the filmmaker says the tool can assist effects work but should not replace crews.

Ridley Scott has jumped back into the Alien pipeline, rewriting the next film himself and steering the franchise toward a Covenant follow-up centered on Michael Fassbender’s David after calling Alien: Romulus a fixer-upper.

At the 78th Emmys’ Creative Arts Night 2, Apple TV’s Widow’s Bay led with eight wins, HBO Max’s DTF: St. Louis took six, and canceled Prime Video series Spider-Noir won five; Apple TV topped outlets with 18.

Focus Features paid $14 million for Obsession after Sony was outbid by a couple million on the low-budget horror breakout, now nearing $510 million worldwide. Tom Rothman also used the Lumière Summit to tout Spider-Man: Brand New Day’s $2.4 billion haul and argue that theatrical is very much alive.

Jacob Elordi is circling Ari Aster's Scapegoat opposite Scarlett Johansson; A24 is backing the film, which will be Aster's fourth feature for the company.