With the very best time for watching scary films just around the corner, a whole host of upcoming horror movies are on their way to take us through September and into Halloween full scream ahead.
It should be no surprise that this time of year brings horror fans all sorts of treats. Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance is delivering body horror back onto our screens with a satirical, feminine, neon-soaked twist. All manner of supernatural entities are set to terrorise audiences in Colm McCarthy’s Bagman, Damian Mc Carthy’s Oddity and Parker Finn’s Smile 2.
JT Mollner and Damien Leone are making sure horror’s serial killers keep doing their thing in Strange Darling and Terrifier 3 respectively. And Frankie Freako and Your Monster are bringing us lighter fare via mad and magical monsters.
If that wasn’t enough, the scares won’t be stopping beyond Halloween. The end of the year will have plenty of bite with new adaptations of classic vampire stories Salem’s Lot and Nosferatu. Not to mention Amy Adams in Nightbitch, Halle Berry in Never Let Go, Hugh Grant in Heretic, Samara Weaving in Azrael, and the new Rosemary’s Baby prequel Apartment 7A.
Below is our pick of the most exciting upcoming horror movies still to come in 2024.
Read more: Best Horror movies | Best Netflix horror movies | Movie release dates | Upcoming movies | New TV shows
The Substance
Release date: September 20, 2024
Director Coralie Fargeat announced her stunning cinematic arrival in 2017 with the blood-soaked rape-revenge flick Revenge, and now she’s back with her much-anticipated sophomore effort The Substance. Starring Demi Moore (Ghost, Disclosure), Margaret Qualley (Poor Things, Sanctuary) and Dennis Quaid (The Day After Tomorrow, The Intruder), The Substance follows a fading celebrity who decides to use a black market cell-replicating drug that temporarily creates a younger, better version of herself. The film won the Best Screenplay Award at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, and is a dark, wild, and stylish movie. It’s looking to be one of the best and most successful genre movies of 2024. Don’t miss this one.
Bagman
Release date: September 27, 2024
Filmmkaer Colm McCarthy is back in the horror director’s chair following his 2016 zombie hit The Girl With All The Gifts, with this family-centric creep-fest coming to our screens in September. Bagman follows Patrick (Sam Claflin), a father desperately struggling against his deepest inner anxieties when a sinister threat from his childhood returns to haunt him and his family. The figure of the Bagman feeds on children’s fear, preying on ‘nice’ kids and stealing them away in his bag, and now he’s after Patrick’s young son. Also starring Antonia Thomas and William Hope, you might not want to let this one out.
Strange Darling
Release date: September 20, 2024
Following its critically acclaimed premiere at 2023’s Fantastic Fest, and currently sitting at a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, the smart, twisty new horror movie Strange Darling is set for cinema release this August. The film is directed by JT Mollner and stars some exciting talent including Willa Fitzgerald (The Fall of the House of Usher), Kyle Gallner (Smile, Jennifer’s Body, The Passenger), and Barbara Hershey (Black Swan, the Insidious movies). Strange Darling takes a dark sideways look at modern dating and women’s safety, trussed up in a frenetic serial killer narrative that’s full of surprises, when a twisted one-night stand spirals into a vicious murder spree. With horror master Mike Flanagan calling it “sublimely brilliant” and advising audiences to go in blind, this should be one very much on horror fans’ radars.
Never Let Go
Release date: September 20, 2024
Alexander Aja, one of the enfant terrible of French horror cinema, known for movies like Switchblade Romance, Horns, Crawl, and the remake of The Hills Have Eyes, is back with his new movie, Never Let Go, which follows a family that has been haunted by an evil spirit for years. Oscar-winner Halle Berry stars as the mother taking care of her two young sons after the world has ended, until their safety and their surroundings come into question when one of the boys begins to doubt whether the evil is real. Reminiscent of films like Bird Box and the recent Arcadian, the title ‘Never Let Go’ refers to the family’s mantra, as they stay attached to the ropes that tether them to their remote cabin whenever they venture forth from its relative safety. The marketing suggests various sources for the family’s peril, including scary visions, their natural surroundings, and potentially some large scaly monsters. All will be revealed this September.
Apartment 7A
Release date: September 27, 2024
This prequel to the 1968 occult horror classic Rosemary’s Baby is set in mid-'60s York City, where a struggling young dancer suffers a devastating injury and finds herself drawn in by dark forces through a peculiar, well-connected, older couple who promise her a shot at fame. Directed by Natalie Erika James, who made her feature debut in 2020 with the excellent supernatural chiller Relic, and starring Julia Garner (The Assistant), Dianne Wiest (The Lost Boys, Edward Scissorhands), and Jim Sturgess (The Other Me), Apartment 7A explores what happened in the apartment before Rosemary moved in.
Azrael
Release date: September 27, 2024
A new action-packed horror movie starring genre darling Samara Weaving (Mayhem, The Babysitter, Ready or Not, Scream VI) and directed by E.L. Katz (Cheap Thrills), Azrael had its world premiere at SXSW in March, hit the UK at August’s FrightFest, and is now due to come to cinemas at the end of September. In a post-apocalyptic world, a cult of zealots hunt down a young woman who is to be sacrificed to pacify an ancient evil, but Azrael (Weaving) will stop at nothing to ensure her own survival and she makes a savage bid for freedom that accelerates towards a vicious, revenge-fueled showdown. The film also features an impressive genre-leaning supporting cast including Nathan Stewart-Jarrett (Femme, Candyman), Vic Carmen Sonne (Holiday), and Katariina Unt (November).
Oddity
Release date: October 3, 2024
For anyone who’s seen Damian McCarthy’s previous horror film Caveat, and subsequently never slept soundly again, the prospect of another haunting feature from the director is both a thrilling and terrifying one. McCarthy’s sophomore movie, another Shudder original, follows Carolyn Bracken (You Are Not My Mother) as Darcy, a woman who hopes to uncover the truth behind her sister's death with the ‘help’ of a wooden mannequin. With the tagline ‘every murder lives on’, Oddity is very much a mystery to be solved, and if you are familiar with Caveat, you might even recognise a familiar long-eared face. This will definitely be one to watch in the dark.
Salem’s Lot
Release date: October 3, 2024
Just when you didn’t think there could be any more Stephen King adaptations, another tome is added to the ‘time for a remake’ shelf. And this time, it’s a heavy hitter. For those of a certain age, one of the most terrifying horror moments lurks in Tobe Hooper’s Salem’s Lot TV series from 1979 as a vampire child arrives at a window asking to be let in… This means no pressure for Conjuring Universe staple Gary Dauberman on both directing and screenplay duties. The good news is that given that he is also responsible for the screenplay of both parts of IT, Dauberman already has keen King conversion chops. The similar ‘terror in a small town’ theme of Salem’s Lot as a vampire holes up in the old house on the hill could mean very good things. The movie was initially meant to release in 2022 but, after a 2023 date was cruelly snatched away, we're now excited to be looking at October this year.
Frankie Freako
Release date: October 4, 2024
Director Steven Kostanski has had a successful career in horror to date, with 2016’s superb cosmic horror The Void, 2018’s Leprechaun Returns – a late-franchise entry that was a surprise hit with fans, and 2020’s hilarious sci-fi monster movie Psycho Goreman, and now he’s back. In Kostanski’s latest off-the-wall offering, a workaholic yuppie called Conor is in an existential rut until one night he catches a bizarre advertisement for a party hotline hosted by a strange dancing goblin: the titular Frankie Freako. With an aesthetic that calls back to ‘80s and ‘90s practical monster horror, and a zany sense of humour that will have audiences rolling in the aisles, Frankie Freako should be an entertaining entry on any genre fan’s spooky season watchlist.
Smile 2
Release date: October 18, 2024
After Smile made an impressive $217m worldwide in 2022, it was always likely that Paramount Pictures and Temple Hill Entertainment would opt for a sequel, and after a fair amount of secrecy and teases, it has now been confirmed to be hitting our screens just in time for Halloween. Director Parker Finn is back, and the sequel is taking the chilling phenomenon from the first movie to a new level as global pop sensation Skye Riley begins experiencing increasingly terrifying and inexplicable events. Performer Naomi Scott (Power Rangers, Charlie’s Angels) stars as Skye, and a viral marketing campaign for the film has also seen a single titled ‘Blood on White Satin’ released by the actress/fictional pop star at the center of the movie. Rosemarie DeWitt (The Staircase), Kyle Gallner (Jennifer’s Body, Scream, The Passenger), and Lukas Gage (Assassination Nation, How to Blow Up a Pipeline) also star.
Watch the Smile 2 trailer here.
Terrifier 3
Release date: October 11
If you’re a horror fan, you might have had long lost friends get in touch at one point last year just to ask you if you had managed to catch a certain murderous clown movie. Art the Clown, the sadistic villain of Terrifier 2, apparently had cinemagoers requiring (helpfully branded) sick bags. The hype, not to put too fine a point on it, was real. And it’s impossible to argue with the figures. Terrifier 2 - a fun, gory, if overly long throwback slasher movie - cost only $250,0000 to make but grim reaped a cool $15 million at the global box office. Hence Terrifier 3, which will debut exclusively on US horror streaming service Screambox.
As reported by Bloody Disgusting, director Damien Leone is excited to bring even more extremity to the series for this threequel. “Aside from a yearning for new and exciting horror villains like Art the Clown, a large part of Terrifier 2’s success was based on its unprecedented theatrical release and its uncompromising nature. It’s pretty clear that we’re now entering a slasher genre renaissance; perhaps the biggest one since the '90s. Filmmakers like myself are gonna have to keep pushing the envelope so it’s encouraging when a company respects a director’s vision and understands what makes a certain type of film successful.”
Your Monster
Release date: October 25, 2024
Directed by Caroline Lindy in her feature debut, and starring Melissa Barrera (Scream, Abigail), Meghann Fahy (The White Lotus) and Edmund Donovan (Civil War), Your Monster is a romantic-comedy-horror film about falling in love with your inner rage. Barrera plays Laura Franco, a musical theatre actress who, after her life falls to pieces when her boyfriend dumps her as she’s recovering from cancer, finds her voice again when she meets a terrifying, yet weirdly charming monster living in her closet. Tommy Dewey, who also Executive Produced the film, reprises his role as ‘Monster’ in this genre mash-up, following his appearance in Lindy’s 2020 short of the same name.
Heretic
Release date: November 15, 2024
Hugh Grant may not be the first person to spring to mind when you think of horror movie baddies, with his history of period dramas, romantic comedies, and kids films, but as Mr Reed in Brian Woods and Scott Beck’s upcoming film Heretic, he looks to be delivering a particularly menacing turn. The movie also stars Sophie Thatcher (The Boogeyman, Yellowjackets) and Chloe East (The Wolf of Snow Hollow) as two young religious women going door-to-door, who find themselves drawn into a game of cat and mouse when they enter Mr Reed’s home. Woods and Beck return as directing partners following previous genre outings together with Haunt (2019) and 65 (2023), and Heretic is produced by A24, so we’re excited to see the toe-curling results coming out from this impressive team of collaborators.
Nightbitch
Release date: December 6, 2024
Based on Rachel Yoder’s novel of the same name, and with a screenplay penned by Yoder and director Marielle Heller (A Beautiful Day in the Neighbourhood, Can You Ever Forgive Me?), Nightbitch is the new darkly comedic horror movie starring Amy Adams (Arrival, Nocturnal Animals) as a woman who pauses her career to be a stay-at-home mother, only to find that her domesticity soon takes a surreal turn. The story was adapted with Adams in mind, (she also produces), and co-stars Scoot NcNairy (Gone Girl, Destroyer), Mary Holland (Self Reliance), and the iconic Jessica Harper (Suspiria, Phantom of the Paradise, Bones and All).
Nosferatu
Release date: December 25, 2024
We’ve been teased with Robert Eggers’ adaptation of Nosferatu for a while now. First it was happening, then it wasn’t, then it was, and now we’ve finally gotten a first look! Following the 1922 classic directed by F.W. Murnau and the 1979 remake from Werner Herzog, Eggers (The Witch, The Lighthouse, The Northman) is officially bringing his version of one of the most genuinely chilling vampire tales to the big screen - and it’s gearing up to continue the tradition of Count Orlok being a truly terrifying monster. The chameleonic Bill Skarsgard (IT, Barbarian) will embody Orlok this time around, alongside another impressive Eggers' ensemble including Lily-Rose Depp, Willem Dafoe, Nicholas Hoult, Ralph Ineson, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson. We can’t wait to sink our teeth into this one!
Watch the first Nosferatu trailer now.
