Netflix, A24 & Curry Barker

Shudder has acquired Rebekah McKendry's vampire horror Sundown; Raven Banner negotiated for the filmmakers, with Olwen Fouéré, Camille Sullivan and Summer H. Howell starring.

Focus Features’ roughly $15M pickup for Curry Barker’s Obsession beat Netflix’s straight-to-streaming offer after TIFF; the microbudget horror cost about $600K-$700K and Barker already has Universal/Blumhouse-Atomic Monster’s Anything But Ghosts next.

Neon snagged global rights to Luca Guadagnino’s nearly finished $50 million Artificial after Amazon dropped it; New York Film Festival is also using Takashi Yamazaki’s Godzilla sequel as a high-profile unfinished launch title.

HBO Max lines up Evil Dead Burn for Oct. 2, with HBO linear premiere on Oct. 3; the theatrical-to-streaming window lands just ahead of Halloween for Ghost House Pictures and Warner Bros. Discovery.

A24 is pushing for major-studio theatrical terms while the Paramount-WBD merger clears another legal hurdle; Disney is warning staff about a much smaller org as consolidation pressure builds.

Meta is rebooting its immersive-entertainment push with Imax Enhanced-certified VR glasses, betting on lighter consumer hardware and post-theatrical viewing for partners including Disney, Peacock, Paramount+, YouTube and HBO Max.

Spain’s audiovisual push got a fresh boost from the promised €1.7bn España Crece lane and €240m already invested across 12 companies; San Sebastián’s industry crowd has swelled past 2,400, while Brad Pitt’s Plan B/Paramount survival thriller Heart Of The Beast was among the marquee premieres.

SAG-AFTRA’s $28,933 annual earnings floor is pushing veteran actors like Heather Matarazzo and Jack Haven toward coverage loss; the minimum is set to rise by about $900 a year through 2030.

16 features, 150 shorts and 26 screenplay finalists; world premieres include Death Came Knocking, Liv’s Last Ride, When You See It and The Curse of Tahu’a, while The Last Temptation of Becky gets its Midwest premiere ahead of theatrical release and Outbreak adds a new digital showcase Oct. 19-26.

Screamfest returns Oct. 6-15 at TCL Chinese Theatre with 10 days of horror premieres and special events; opening night is Jeremy Weiss’ The Night Driver starring Josh Lucas, David Arquette and Alyssa Milano.

Toronto After Dark opens its 19th edition with Brian Duffield’s Whalefall; the lineup runs from horror and sci-fi to action, with Austin Abrams and Josh Brolin on the opener.

Shudder’s October slate adds V/H/S/Mixtape, Infirmary, Hallowarrior, The Cycle, Big Baby and Hunting Mathew Collins, with Dragula season 7 and Halloween-night catalog programming rounding out the month; the service is leaning on originals, franchise play and event nights to own spooky season.

BUDDY gets an interactive sing-along theatrical re-release, extending the horror hit with a new fan-event window.

$108.3 million worldwide opening for Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil reboot; CAPCOM’s Resident Evil Requiem is over $500 million lifetime, but the film’s launch only modestly lifted game engagement once discounting is stripped out. PlayStation saw the biggest bump; Steam barely moved.

Universal signs Curry Barker to write, direct and produce an original horror feature under an eight-figure pact after Obsession crossed $500M worldwide; Netflix had previously tried to take the film straight to streaming.

Fantastic Fest interviews surface fresh release timing and production details across the slate: Beware Boiúna is set for Oct. 2 after a Colombia shoot; Primetime lands Sept. 25; Pathetic Fallacy, Play House, and What Happened to Doris? all tease completed genre pics headed to theaters.

Frank Martinez exits A24 for Bleecker Street, where he takes over theatrical distribution for the company and Crosswalk; the hire comes after A24’s domestic box office more than doubled under his watch. The slate he’s inheriting includes Victorian Psycho, giving Bleecker a clearer horror lane heading into the fall.

$40M budget, $20M-$29M opening tracking; Amazon MGM is leaning theatrical on the Colleen Hoover adaptation with Anne Hathaway and Dakota Johnson fronting the cast. "Verity" is positioned as a fall box-office play with thriller mechanics and crossover author heat.

Netflix renews The Beast in Me for a second season after a No. 1 Global Top 10 launch, 43 million views in seven weeks and two Emmy wins; Howard Gordon extends his Netflix partnership and Claire Danes returns.

Particle 6 adds Rob Minkoff as EP on Storm Dogs, an AI/live-action family feature targeting 2027 production with no distributor announced yet; the company says AI workflows are now running through advertising, film and TV.

Ella Purnell, Caleb Landry Jones and Samba Schutte join Ari Aster’s A24/Square Peg feature Scapegoat. Scarlett Johansson, Jacob Elordi and Jude Law are already on board, keeping the project’s cast package expanding around Aster’s script.

Fantastic Pitches keeps feeding the indie-horror pipeline; Play House’s path from the 2025 pitch competition to a Fantastic Fest feature slot underscores how the program is turning out market-ready genre projects.

Saw's next installment is moving again after years in development limbo; no new casting or release-date details surfaced.

John Goblikon is fronting No One Survives, a horror-comedy series created and EP'd by Dave Rispoli and Brandon Dermer with practical effects by Mark Villalobos. Clayton Farris, Ali Macofsky, Christian Pierce and Jason Rodelo are among the cast as the Nekrogoblikon character expands into scripted TV.

Netflix is developing Helo, a police-helicopter thriller with Andrés Baiz directing, Patrick Aison writing and Edward Berger producing through Nine Hours; the streamer has also lined up Baiz on another project, signaling continued investment in the filmmaker.

Crave's first-ever half-hour drama rolls out Oct. 23 in Canada; the eight-episode Yaga pairs Kat Sandler's Baba Yaga adaptation with AMC Global Media holding U.S. rights and directing from Rachel Talalay and David Frazee.

Beyond Fest is launching the world premiere of Alison-Eve Hammersley’s found-footage feature Erie on Oct. 1; no distributor or release date is set, with Brooklyn Horror next on deck.