Hollywood has lined up plenty of high-profile horror projects in 2018, and no surprise,
most of the best ones are slated to hit theaters right around Halloween.
From jungle predators to freaky nuns, the future looks very dark indeed, in the best
possible way.
Here are all the horror movies that'll blow you away this Halloween season.
Slender Man
Lovers of creepy internet memes have a pretty good idea of what to expect with this upcoming
horror film.
The Slender Man has stalked the Web since 2009, when a Photoshop contest produced a
picture of the tall, thin, faceless stalker of hapless children.
The forum poster who made the image even has a writing credit on the film, a development
he probably didn't expect when he set out to freak people out with his Photoshop skills.
"Then that's what I will say, unless Slender Man commands me to say something else."
The film's plot involves teen girls performing rituals related to the Slender Man, and stars
Joey King and Jaz Sinclair.
Sony and Screen Gems have slated Slender Man for release on August 24th.
Cadaver
Audiences may know Shay Mitchell best from her role on TV's Pretty Little Liars, but
this Halloween season, the Canadian actress is making the jump to horror with Cadaver.
Mitchell stars as a morgue technician and disgraced former cop with a drug problem,
whose late-night shifts at the morgue take a turn for the sinister when she receives
a badly brutalized body.
Veteran Dutch director Diederik Van Rooijen makes his Hollywood debut with this feature.
Although Cadaver has wrapped principal photography, audiences will have to wait until August 24th
to get a look.
The Little Stranger
Writer/director Lenny Abrahamson spent several years quietly making a name for himself in
his native Ireland before making a huge splash with the 2015 international production Room.
Despite receiving only a limited release in the U.S., Room was nominated for a slew of
awards and snagged a Best Actress Oscar for lead Brie Larson.
For his follow-up project, Abrahamson has taken on an adaptation of the well-received
2009 novel The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters, a film which took about ten seconds to get
snapped up by Focus Features for worldwide distribution after going into production in
summer 2017.
The post-World War 2 ghost story boasts a strong cast which includes Domnhall Gleason,
Ruth Wilson, and Will Poulter.
The Little Stranger is slated for release on August 31st.
The Nun
The series that New Line is now officially calling the "Conjuring Universe" is getting
another spinoff this Halloween season.
The franchise scored yet another box office hit with Annabelle: Creation, a pre-prequel
exploring the origins of the sinister doll from The Conjuring 2, pushing the series'
worldwide box office take up over the $1 billion mark.
Hitting those kinds of numbers can only ensure plenty more films in the pipeline, and first
up is The Nun, which will add some backstory to one of Conjuring 2's most terrifying characters.
American Horror Story's Taissa Farmiga, the younger sister of main Conjuring series star
Vera Farmiga, has been cast in the lead, with Bonnie Aarons reprising her role as the demonic
nun Valak.
Creatively, the spinoff appears to be in good hands, Annabelle and Annabelle: Creation screenwriter
Gary Dauberman penned the script, and Corin Hardy has been tapped to direct.
Hardy used practical effects whenever possible on the shoot, portions of which took place
on location in Romania and Transylvania.
He told Entertainment Weekly:
"I always want to say, 'Let's do everything as much as we possibly can for real, including
in-camera stunts, effects, and then use the CGI to be a beautiful, original, invisible
tool.'"
The Nun will return to scare your pants off on September 7th, 2018.
Slaughterhouse Rulez
Horror comedy is notoriously difficult to pull off, but if any filmmakers have earned
the benefit of the doubt, it's Simon Pegg and Nick Frost.
Their 2005 classic Shaun of the Dead remains a sterling example of the genre, and Slaughterhouse
Rulez promises to deliver shocks and laughs in equal measure.
The the first effort from the pair's new Stolen Picture banner takes place in a British boarding
school that "...becomes a bloody battleground when a mysterious sinkhole appears at a nearby
fracking site, unleashing unspeakable horror."
With Pegg and Frost serving as producers, the film is certainly in good hands.
Writer/director Crispian Mills also directed Pegg in 2012's horror comedy A Fantastic Fear
of Everything.
The film is backed by Sony Pictures, which should ensure a fairly wide release when it
hits theaters on September 7th.
The Predator
Attempts to reinvigorate the Predator franchise have not historically fared well.
The Alien vs. Predator mashup series failed to do justice to either franchise, and the
2010 sequel Predators garnered mixed reviews.
But the forthcoming sequel The Predator appears to be in very good hands, Shane Black will
direct from a script he co-wrote with Fred Dekker.
The two previously collaborated on 1987's The Monster Squad.
Featured in the cast are Keegan-Michael Key, Olivia Munn, and Jacob Tremblay, who's apparently
really getting into the role.
"Jacob!"
"Get to the chopper.
We have to get out here!
Go!
Now!"
And if all of this isn't enough to get fans excited, then maybe the words of 20th Century
Fox CEO Stacey Snider will do the trick.
She said:
"We've got a Predator film coming out that is unexpected and utterly fresh.
[...] From the first page, it didn't read like a Predator film."
The Predator sneaks into theaters on September 14th.
The House with a Clock in Its Walls
In this upcoming film, a 10-year-old boy moves in with an eccentric uncle, only to find his
house full of secret passageways and strange goings-on.
It turns out that his uncle is a warlock, a witch lives next door, and the house is
a conduit for weird black magic rituals.
"You've told Lewis everything?"
"Well not everything."
The House with a Clock in its Walls is an adaptation of the 1973 gothic horror novel
of the same name, and there's already some serious talent on board.
Notorious horror filmmaker Eli Roth will direct a cast that includes Jack Black and Cate.
With its strong fantasy horror vibe, this movie is bound to be a unique addition to
the 2018 Halloween season.
Find out when it premieres on September 21st.
Hellfest
This upcoming horror movie is set at a Halloween-themed amusement park where a psycho slasher decides
to have a little holiday fun of his own.
Gregory Plotkin, editor of Happy Death Day and Get Out, has taken over as director, and
Amy Forsyth, Reign Edwards, and Bex Taylor-Klaus have joined the cast.
Expectations are high for this one, with former James Cameron partner and Walking Dead producer
Gale Anne Hurd also involved.
CBS Films president Terry Press has been championing the film for years, believing it has the potential
to start a new Purge-like horror franchise.
You can judge for yourself when Hellfest debuts on September 28th, 2018.
Something in the Dark
This tech-based thriller has a unique premise: a blind woman has her sight restored by a
pair of high-tech eyeglasses.
Unfortunately, her vision may turn out to be a little better than she bargained for.
The glasses apparently let her see ghosts, and she can't tell the difference between
the ghouls and the living.
Even worse, she begins to suspect that a lurking entity she keeps glimpsing might be coming
for her.
The film's website states that it will contain no dialogue, with the goal of creating
"...a more involving and creepy experience which plays exactly the same to any audience,
regardless of what language they speak."
"In other words, there is literally not a single word spoken throughout the entire film."
The first feature for visual effects artist turned debuting writer-director Steven Aguilera,
Something in the Dark will definitely be a unique experience.
It's currently slated for release on October 15th, 2018.
Halloween
Remakes and reboots of classic horror franchises haven't exactly been cinematic gold in recent
years.
With yet another Nightmare reboot struggling to get off the ground and a planned second
Friday the 13th re-imagining still up in the air, fans could be forgiven for not getting
too excited about the prospect of a new Halloween, but they should be.
Eastbound & Down star Danny McBride and producer David Gordon Green came together to work on
the concept for the new film, which they pitched directly to original director/co-writer John
Carpenter.
Carpenter's reaction, posted to his Facebook page, was enough to get any fan's heart racing:
"David and Danny both came to my office recently with Jason Blum and shared their vision for
the new movie and…
WOW.
They get it.
I think you're gonna dig it."
He also told CBS that the new movie would essentially retcon everything after Halloween
II.
"It's pretending the other sequels didn't happen."
McBride echoed that idea, saying:
"It's gonna continue the story of Michael Myers in a really grounded way.
And for our mythology, we're focusing mainly on the first two movies and what that sets
up."
Jamie Lee Curtis and Nick Castle, the original Michael Myers, are reprising their roles from
the 1978 film.
Miramax will release Halloween on October 19th, 2018, just in time for the scariest
night of the year.
Overlord
From J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot production company, Overlord is a World War II-set horror flick
about a group of American soldiers who make a horrifying discovery in a Nazi-occupied
village.
Since this is a Bad Robot production, there's been a lot of speculation that Overlord may
be yet another stealth entry in the Cloverfield universe, a theory which was apparently confirmed.
How will it tie into the franchise?
We can all find out when Overlord debuts in theaters on October 26th.
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