News

Screen Internationalis rounding up the key projects launched before and during this year’s American Film Market (AFM), which runsNovember 5-10 at thePalms Casino Resort.

Refresh the page for latest updates.

The Last Druid

Russell Crowe will play a Celtic druid battling the Roman Empire. Range Media Partners and CAA Media Finance jointly represent US rights. Will Eubank will direct.

Sales:AGC International

Cliffhanger reboot

Lily James and Pierce Brosnan to star in reboot of the Sylvester Stallone mountain action classic. Jaume Collet-Serra is directing from a script by Ana Lily Amirpour.

Sales: Rocket Science (international), CAA Media Finance

The...

Getting a film made is far easier said than done. That's why most Hollywood movies are based on pre-existing material -- both to try and speed up the process of generating a story itself, and to have some assurance that there's an audience for the story. This mentality has led to truly original movies becoming something of a rarity. Truth is, Hollywood has always looked to existing IP (intellectual property).What's new about today's situation is that the IP they're generally tapping tends to be of a short-form or experiential variety: either remakes, reboots, and legacy sequels to older movies, or TV shows, comic books, and video games.

In the early decades of cinema, however, the main source for adaptations was literature. Where comics, games, TV and other movies are all visual mediums and come pre-loaded with their own imagery, books are a covenant between the author and reader's imagination,...

Uma Thurman, Sir Anthony Hopkins and Phoebe Dynevor are starring in a big new project!

Notes on a Scandal director Richard Eyre will helm The Housekeeper, a romance that fictionalizes the inspiration behind Daphne Du Maurier’s Rebecca, via Variety.

Keep reading to find out more…

The script is being written by bestselling author Rose Tremain, based on her own short story and forthcoming novel.

Here’s a plot summary: The Housekeeper is set in the mystic, brooding and wild landscape of Cornwall, the rugged Atlantic foot of England, where Danni (Thurman), housekeeper at Manderville Hall — a grand and historic house owned by the wealthy and widowed Lord DeWithers (Hopkins) — falls prey to the glance of a young and beautiful visitor, the novelist Daphne Du Maurier (Dynevor). For one, their affair is an all-consuming love, for the other an intoxicating realization of her secret longings.”

“Rose Tremain’s story grapples with love,...

Uma Thurman, Anthony Hopkins and Phoebe Dynevor have been cast in Richard Eyre’s upcoming ‘The Housekeeper’.

Said to be an “evocative romance fictionalizing the inspiration behind Daphne Du Maurier’s “Rebecca,” the film is set in the mystic, brooding and wild landscape of Cornwall. The rugged Atlantic foot of England, where Danni (Thurman), the housekeeper at Manderville Hall — a grand and historic house owned by the wealthy and widowed Lord DeWithers (Hopkins) — falls prey to the glance of a young and beautiful visitor, the novelist Daphne Du Maurier (Dynevor). For one, their affair is an all-consuming love, for the other an intoxicating realization of her secret longings.

Also in news – Chris Hemsworth eyed for Disney’s ‘Prince Charming’ feature

Eyre will take the helm on a script penned by the bestselling author Rose Tremain, based on her own short story and forthcoming novel. The film is being produced by Julia Taylor-Stanley and Kevin Loader.

“Notes on a Scandal” and “Iris” director Richard Eyre has assembled a starry cast for his next feature, an evocative romance fictionalizing the inspiration behind Daphne Du Maurier’s “Rebecca.”

“The Housekeeper” — being launched at AFM by Embankment Films alongside CAA Media Finance, which is co-repping U.S. rights — will be led by Oscar nominee Uma Thurman, two-time Oscar winner Sir Anthony Hopkins “(The Father,” “The Silence of the Lambs”) and Phoebe Dynevor.

Eyre will direct from a script written by bestselling author Rose Tremain, based on her own short story and forthcoming novel. The film is being produced by Julia Taylor-Stanley and Kevin Loader.

“The Housekeeper” is set in the mystic, brooding and wild landscape of Cornwall, the rugged Atlantic foot of England, where Danni (Thurman), housekeeper at Manderville Hall — a grand and historic house owned by the wealthy and widowed Lord DeWithers (Hopkins) — falls prey to the glance...

For over fifty years, Francis Ford Coppola has been a towering, and often controversial, figure in American Cinema. His filmography is one of the most legendary of all time and includes some of the greatest movies ever made like The Godfather (1972) and The Godfather Part II (1974), The Conversation (1974), Apocalypse Now (1979), and more. It also includes wild swings—One from the Heart (1982), Rumble Fish (1983), Peggy Sue Got Married (1986), Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992)—which sometimes paid off, but sometimes did not. This year, his forty-year-in-the-making passion project Megalopolis finally hit screens for the general public after a festival run that provoked a mixed critical response to say the least. It is a gigantic movie made on a huge budget with vast, and sometimes impenetrable, ideas. His very first film, however, was a much more modest project, made on a minuscule budget, and…it was a horror movie.

Dementia 13 (1963) is very much a...

When it comes to getting into noir films, it's always worth asking, "Where should I start?" After all, the genre is so time-specific -- it existed in its purest form only in the 1940s and early '50s -- and so full of familiar signifiers -- dame with a secret, jaded investigator, corrupt systems -- that it can sometimes be tough to tell noir titles apart. Start digging into the best the genre has to offer, though, and you'll discover that film noir encompasses much more than the striking style choices and cynicism that have become its cultural shorthand over the years.

Take the two highest-rated noir films on Rotten Tomatoes, for example. According to the aggregate site, only two film noirs have a 100% score on the website, meaning that every single critic included in the site's tally reviewed the movie positively. The first, "Shadow of a Doubt," is an early,...

Apple TV+ has rounded out the main cast of its upcoming series adaptation of the Mick Herron novel “Down Cemetery Road.”

Adeel Akhtar, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, Tom Goodman-Hill, Darren Boyd, Tom Riley, Adam Godley, Sinead Matthews, Ken Nwosu, Fehinti Balogun, and Aiysha Hart have all been cast in the series.

They will appear alongside previously announced leads Emma Thompson and Ruth Wilson.

The official description for the series states, “When a house explodes in a quiet Oxford suburb and a girl disappears in the aftermath, neighbor Sarah Tucker (Wilson) becomes obsessed with finding her and enlists the help of private investigator Zoë Boehm (Thompson). Zoë and Sarah suddenly find themselves in a complex conspiracy that reveals that people long believed dead are still among the living, while the living are fast joining the dead.”

Akhtar will appear as Hamza. Stewart-Jarrett will play Downey. Goodman-Hill has been cast as Gerard, and Boyd has been cast as C.

After revealing that he’s been broke, actor Armie Hammer is now forced to part with his cherished truck. The actor, known for his work in movies like Call Me By Your Name, has been largely cast out of Hollywood following multiple s*xual assault allegations.

Armie Hammer in Rebecca | Credit: Netflix

He has denied any such allegations and has recently relocated to his birthplace, Los Angeles. However, his financial struggles have caused him to trade in his truck for a more affordable vehicle.

Armie Hammer Had to Sell Beloved Truck Amid Financial Woes

Armie Hammer recently took to his Instagram to share an update about his move back to Los Angeles. In the short video clip, the actor revealed that he would be selling the truck that he bought as a Christmas gift to himself in 2017.

A still from Death on the Nile | Credit: 20th Century Fox

Explaining the reason behind his decision,...

New Trailer for The Front Room: "Everything goes to hell for newly-pregnant Belinda (Brandy) after her mother-in-law (Kathryn Hunter) moves in. As the diabolical guest tries to get her claws on the child, Belinda must draw the line somewhere…"

Directed by Max Eggers and Sam Eggers Screenplay by Max Eggers and Sam Eggers Based on the Short Story by Susan Hill Produced by Lucan Toh, Babak Anvari, David Hinojosa, Julia Oh Starring Brandy Norwood, Andrew Burnap, Neal Huff, and Kathryn Hunter

The Front Room is heading to theaters on September 6th

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Black Chariot: "Inspired by the works of the cinematic legend and Master of Suspense, born on this day in 1899, Hex Studios is excited to announce Black Chariot, an intense and deeply disturbing supernatural horror directed by Lawrie Brewster. Drawing from Alfred Hitchcock’s dark thrillers like Rebecca (1942) and Psycho (1960), Brewster seeks to invoke the master's spirit in his latest spine-chilling horror noir.

Ride the Black Chariot: A Hitchcockian Horror of Vengeance and Retribution

Hex Studios is excited to announce Black Chariot, an intense and deeply disturbing supernatural horror directed by Lawrie Brewster, inspired by the macabre genius of Alfred Hitchcock. Drawing from Hitchcock’s dark thrillers like Rebecca (1942) and Psycho (1960), Brewster seeks to invoke Hitchcock’s spirit, combined with his love of classic film noir and Val Lewton’s atmospheric slow-burn horrors.

Director Lawrie Brewster shared, “My childhood was spent haunted and mesmerized by the romantic and seductive veil Hitchcock cast over me. It shaped my vision of horror, sensuality, and my understanding of fear and obsession. I am thrilled to finally produce a horror film that combines my love for the genre with inspirations drawn from his incomparable genius. Creating a period film and a love letter to that era, in a portrayal of horror that is as hauntingly beautiful as it is terrifying,...

Alfred Hitchcock has long been revered as one of the most influential filmmakers of all time. He also holds the unfortunate distinction of being one of Oscar’s biggest losers, with five Best Director nominations and no wins. Still, who needs an Oscar when you’ve impacted world cinema as significantly as “Hitch” has? Let’s take a look back at 25 of his greatest films, ranked from worst to best.

Known as “the Master of Suspense,” Hitchcock cut his teeth directing silent movies in his native England. With films like “The Lodger” (1927), he gained a reputation for helming tense and stylish psychological thrillers. With the invention of sound came an added element to Hitchcock’s work: a sly sense of humor.

He moved to America in 1940 to direct two films that earned Best Picture nominations: “Foreign Correspondent” and “Rebecca,” which took home the top prize. Hitchcock competed for directing “Rebecca,...

Welcome to the latest edition of our (semi) regular crowdfunding feature here on Nerdly – Back This! – where we take a look at some of the cool content taking the crowdfunding route on sites such as Indiegogo, Greenlit and Kickstarter. In this edition, we’re spotlighting Black Chariot, the latest film from Hex Studios and director Lawrie Brewster.

Hex Studios’ Black Chariot is an intense and deeply disturbing supernatural horror directed by Lawrie Brewster, inspired by the macabre genius of Alfred Hitchcock. Drawing from Hitchcock’s dark thrillers like Rebecca (1942) and Psycho (1960), Brewster seeks to invoke Hitchcock’s spirit, combined with his love of classic film noir and Val Lewton’s atmospheric slow-burn horrors.

Director Lawrie Brewster shared:

My childhood was spent haunted and mesmerized by the romantic and seductive veil Hitchcock cast over me. It shaped my vision of horror, sensuality, and my understanding of fear and obsession. I am...

M. Night Shyamalan is a divisive filmmaker; depending on who you ask the director is either a brilliant visionary or a man whose films are too flimsy to hold together. What nobody can deny about Shyamalan is that the man really, really loves movies. In a 2023 interview, he discussed a variety of his greatest cinematic influences with obvious enthusiasm, claiming he has a Blu-Ray collection of over 800 titles, and on Twitter, he frequently shares with his fans his Criterion Collection choices and recommendations.

Raised in the Philadelphia area by a Indian family, Shyamalan began his career with two small indie dramas before becoming one of the biggest breakout auteurs of his generation with “The Sixth Sense,” a cultural phenomenon that introduced the world to his earnest brand of horror and his signature love of plot twists. In the 21st century, Shyamalan has experienced highs and lows as a filmmaker, but...

Ride the "Black Chariot" - A Hitchcockian Horror of Vengeance and Retribution: "Hex Studios is excited to announce Black Chariot, an intense and deeply disturbing supernatural horror directed by Lawrie Brewster, inspired by the macabre genius of Alfred Hitchcock. Drawing from Hitchcock's dark thrillers like Rebecca (1942) and Psycho (1960), Brewster seeks to invoke Hitchcock's spirit, combined with his love of classic film noir and Val Lewton’s atmospheric slow-burn horrors.

Director Lawrie Brewster shared, “My childhood was spent haunted and mesmerized by the romantic and seductive veil Hitchcock cast over me. It shaped my vision of horror, sensuality, and my understanding of fear and obsession. I am thrilled to finally produce a horror film that combines my love for the genre with inspirations drawn from his incomparable genius. Creating a period film and a love letter to that era, in a portrayal of horror that is as hauntingly beautiful as it is terrifying,...

When IndieWire recently ranked the 25 best films of Alfred Hitchcock, it was probably no surprise to anyone that “Mr. and Mrs. Smith,” the director’s sole attempt at a light romantic comedy, didn’t make the cut. Even Hitchcock himself tended to underrate the film, as when he told interviewer François Truffaut that “since I didn’t really understand the type of people who were portrayed in the film, all I did was photograph the scenes as written.” From a filmmaker who regularly dismissed movies he considered uncinematic as mere “photographs of people talking,” this was the ultimate self-directed insult.

Yet even a casual reappraisal of “Mr. and Mrs. Smith,” newly available in an exquisite Blu-ray special edition from Warner Archive, undermines Hitchcock’s claims about his own movie. While it would be a bridge too far to declare the film a masterpiece on a par with “Psycho” or “Rear Window,...

Producer David O. Selznick was always looking for the next big thing. He had scored an enormous hit — it was a cultural phenom — with his 1939 Civil War drama “Gone with the Wind,’ which won eight Oscars including best picture, director, actress and supporting actress. And for those fashion-minded, “Gwtw” also caused an uptick in sales of the women’s headgear called the snood.

The following year, Selznick produced the best picture winner, Alfred Hitchcock’s romantic mystery “Rebecca.” Four years after ‘Rebecca” on July 20, 1944, Selznick released the sentimental, home-fires-burning drama “Since You Went Away,” which he hoped would the next “Gwtw” in terms of box office and Oscar love.

The world was war weary in 1944. In fact, World War II seemed never ending. The Allied troops launched its invasion of Europe on the beaches of Normandy on June 6th. But even with the success of D-day, the war wouldn’t...

Emerald Fennell just announced her third feature film, and this time, it’ll be an adapted screenplay.

Fennell is set to direct the latest adaptation of Emily Brontë’s beloved “Wuthering Heights” novel. Fennell tweeted a logo for the feature, along with the tagline, “Be with me always. Take any form. Drive me mad.”

IndieWire reached out to Fennell’s representatives for confirmation.

The Oscar winner made her feature directorial debut with “Promising Young Woman” and released “Saltburn” in 2023. Fennell deemed “Saltburn” a “fully Gothic” twisted love story, and now, “Wuthering Heights” will lean into both of those genres. The feature will also reunite Fennell with MRC on the production side, which she collaborated with for “Saltburn.”

“Wuthering Heights” centers on the tortured romance between Cathy and Heathcliff that is rife with revenge.

Fennell previously told Vanity Fair that her filmmaking passion is telling stories of darker desires.

“For that...

On Tuesday June 11 2024, MTV broadcasts Help! I’m in a Secret Relationship!!

Jake & Rebekka Season 3 Episode 3 Episode Summary

In this episode of “Help! I’m in a Secret Relationship!” titled “Jake & Rebekka,” viewers will witness the unfolding drama between Rebekka and Jake. Rebekka has been keeping Jake a secret for the past two years, while Jake has introduced her to all the important people in his life. However, there’s a catch – Jake is not allowed to meet Rebekka’s mom, adding a layer of complexity to their relationship.

As the episode progresses, tensions rise as Jake expresses his desire to take their relationship to the next level by moving in together. Rebekka, torn between her love for Jake and her fear of revealing their relationship to her mother, faces a tough decision. Will she finally come clean about Jake to her mom, or will she continue to keep him hidden from...

Get ready for another episode of “Help! I’m in a Secret Relationship!” as Season 3 Episode 3, titled “Jake & Rebekka,” airs on MTV at 9:00 Pm on Tuesday, June 11, 2024. In this episode, viewers will meet Rebekka and Jake, who have been keeping their relationship under wraps for two years. While Jake has introduced Rebekka to everyone in his life, Rebekka has been unable to do the same, as Jake is not allowed to meet her mom.

As the episode unfolds, viewers will witness the complexities of Jake and Rebekka’s hidden romance and the challenges they face in maintaining secrecy while longing for more openness and integration into each other’s lives. Jake’s desire to take the next step and move in together adds further pressure to their situation, forcing them to confront their fears and uncertainties about revealing their relationship to the world.

With its mix of emotional depth and relatable struggles,...

A film adaptation of author Colleen Hoover’s bestselling romantic thriller “Verity” is in development at Amazon MGM Studios.

Hillary Seitz is currently writing the script. Eat the Cat’s Nick Antosca and Alex Hedlund will produce.

“Verity” follows Lowen Ashleigh, a struggling writer on the brink of financial ruin when she accepts the job offer of a lifetime. Jeremy Crawford, husband of best-selling thriller author Verity Crawford, has hired Lowen to complete the remaining books in a successful series that his wife is unable to finish after a mysterious accident.

Upon arrival at the lavish Crawford estate, Lowen slowly learns that things are not exactly as they seem with the discovery of a secret, unfinished manuscript that may divulge chilling admissions about the family’s past. As Lowen ingratiates herself with Jeremy and his young son Crew, she must discern if Verity’s writings are merely lurid works of...

Jerry Seinfeld’s Unfrosted is loosely based on the invention of Pop-Tarts. Seinfeld’s feature directorial debut uses a shot inspired by the Steven Spielberg classic of 1975, Jaws. In the film, Spielberg uses the Dolly Zoom shot, which the Seinfeld creator has copied in his upcoming Netflix comedy. Seinfeld opened up about how such classic cinematic shots influenced him as a filmmaker.

Jerry Seinfeld’s Unfrosted, releasing on Netflix, will have some interesting cinematic shots

Seinfeld’s film stars an ensemble cast including Jim Gaffigan, Hugh Grant, Melissa McCarthy, and Amy Schumer. Seinfeld, Barry Marder, who writes for Seinfeld’s stand-up shows, and Seinfeld writers Spike Feresten and Andy Robin wrote the screenplay of the film.

Jerry Seinfeld Took Inspiration From Jaws‘ Zolly Shot For Unfrosted

Jerry Seinfeld with Melissa McCarthy and Jim Gaffigan in Unfrosted

Unfrosted stars Jerry Seinfeld and Jim Gaffigan appeared for an interview with Kevin McCarthy for Fox 5 DC.

Alfred Hitchcock is undoubtedly one of the most influential filmmakers that has ever lived and his films have made a mark on filmmakers today. He has an unusual yet affecting way of inducing suspense and intensity in his films and his works like Psycho, Rebecca, To Catch a Thief, Vertigo, North by Northwest, and The Birds are proof of that.

Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo is one of his most acclaimed films

The latter is one of Hitchcock’ most audacious films and actress Tippi Hedren was the lead of the film. The director is known for his rigorous process of bringing his vision to life and this proved to be an excruciating experience for Hedren as she got pecked at by real birds following a last-minute switch-up made by Hitchcock.

Tippi Hedren Was Horrified At Alfred Hitchcock’s Approach While Filming The Birds

Tippi Hedren as Melanie Daniels in Alfred Hitchcock...

Every town seems to have that one house. The one that children walk by with hushed tones and dare each other to sneak onto the porch or ring the doorbell of. In the movies it’s the Myers House, 1428 Elm (at least in the later movies), or the House on Neibolt Street—usually run down and harboring a frightening history. In my neighborhood growing up, it was not a dilapidated old house, just one that seemed very out of place among the homes of the working class that surrounded it. It was a huge two-story white house, buttressed with gigantic pillars, and surrounded by a wrought-iron fence. I never saw anyone come in or out and I always wondered who lived there. In my mind it was a rich old Mrs. Deagle from Gremlins type, and I wondered, “what’s going on in there?” That question is the engine that...

Paul McCartney‘s songs draw influence from numerous things. He has written multiple songs that reference the planet Venus. During an interview, Paul told Taylor Swift how the planet inspired one of those songs. The song in question appeared on one of Paul’s No. 1 albums.

Paul McCartney told Taylor Swift that a book inspired him to write a song about Venus

In a 2020 Rolling Stone article, Paul and Swift interviewed each other. Paul explained his songwriting process. “Sometimes I’ll just be inspired by something,” he said. “I had a little book which was all about the constellations and the stars and the orbits of Venus.”

Swift revealed she knew the song in question. It was “The Kiss of Venus” from the 2020 album McCartney III. Swift must be a big fan of Paul’s if she’s listening to his solo work from the 21st century. Paul didn’t...

Emerald Fennell is sharing her love of Gothic horror movies and twisted erotic thrillers courtesy of her favorite films list.

The “Promising Young Woman” Oscar winner and “Saltburn” director revealed her top movies, ranging from “The Shining” to “Cruel Intentions” and “Jurassic Park.” As Fennell told IndieWire, all modern films inherently draw from cinematic history, with her latest dark comedy “Saltburn” directly inspired by “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” “Rebecca,” and “Atonement.”

“Partly it’s that you can’t make a movie like this without it naturally kind of existing in that world. But the only thing that’s useful about that truly is the familiarity it gives the audience, because you can only really make something uncanny if somebody’s familiar with something,” Fennell said. “You are using those things carefully so that people think they know what they’re getting.”

Fennell previously said during IndieWire’s Filmmaker Toolkit podcast...

Following 2020’s Nobody, Bob Odenkirk will once again be bringing a script by John Wick writer Derek Kolstad to life with Normal – a tale of a small-town sheriff sucked into a vast criminal conspiracy.

Given how popular his performances were in the hit TV show Breaking Bad, fans had long clamoured for Bob Odenkirk to be given bigger and juicier onscreen roles in the wake of that show and its Odenkirk-centric spin-off, Better Caul Saul.

They weren’t the only ones either: Odenkirk himself was spoiling to headline a film project, and perhaps surprisingly, was keen to try his hand at the action genre. The result was 2021’s Nobody, written by John Wick screenwriter Derek Kolstad and featuring Odenkirk as an unlikely lead in a movie full of brawls, bruises and Christopher Lloyd. We really enjoyed it and we weren’t alone either.

While a direct follow-up to Nobody was...

If you want to understand anything about cinema throughout the late '30s to the mid-'60s, first you have to know about the Hays Code. It was a self-imposed censorship for Hollywood studios, essentially forbidding movies from doing anything particularly "lewd" or controversial. Although there was already a list of "Don'ts" and "Be Carefuls" proposed in 1927, it wasn't until 1934 that the studios were truly forced to take it all seriously.

The result was that, for decades, Hollywood was heavily restricted in its ability to deal with real-world social issues or portray its characters in an honest, non-sanitized way. Not only were a generation of movies creatively hindered, but there's been a subsequent widespread misremembering of the time period as being uniquely innocent and chaste. It's common for reactionary political figures to point back to the '50s as this time where everyone was straight, white, polite, and never had sex outside of marriage,...

Parasitic obsession poisons the roots of William Oldroyd’s perverse noir romance “Eileen.” The film is adapted by screenwriter Ottessa Moshfegh and her partner Luke Goebel from her own mean and pungent novella about a repressed 24-year-old prison secretary who, in 1964 Massachusetts, falls under the spell of a beautiful, blond-headed Harvard-grad psychologist named, of all things, Rebecca. Is that on-the-nose-Hitchcockian enough for you?

Eileen is played by Thomasin McKenzie, while Rebecca is played by Anne Hathaway, who slurps martinis and says things like “I shouldn’t smoke, but I do.” She drifts into Eileen’s world like a vapor, and then, just as quickly, is gone. But not without bringing chaos crashing down onto Eileen’s life amid a depraved dance of muted desire.

Hathaway, who is now nominated for a Film Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Performer, certainly evokes Katharine Hepburn (and maybe even Cate Blanchett’s...

Savannah, Georgia is an appropriate setting for a conversation with filmmaker Emerald Fennell about her newest film “Saltburn,” which follows an Oxford student who becomes enmeshed with a wealthy classmate’s eccentric family during a summer at their country estate. “It’s fully Gothic, especially at Halloween, so it’s really my favorite kind of place,” said the director to IndieWire during a recent interview. Though, in an interview setting that featured walls that alternated between hard, slate gray panels, and thin, beaming bars of fluorescent lighting, Fennell joked that the whole thing felt a bit like “a ‘John Wick’ interrogation.”

In town to accept the Spotlight Director Award at the Scad Savannah Film Festival, Fennell denied feeling a daunting amount of pressure around what to follow up her Academy Award-winning debut “Promising Young Woman” with. “I usually have a few things going on, but I don’t write them down.

October is here, and with it a whole host of new movies are available to stream. There is, of course, a bounty of new horror movies coming our way this month as many are ready to celebrate Halloween, but our curated list of the best new movies to stream in October includes plenty of non-horror fare as well. We’ve gone through what’s new on Netflix, Prime Video, Max, Peacock, Paramount+, Hulu and Disney+ to put together a viewing guide that offers something for everyone. From bona fide new releases to library titles newly streaming, you won’t be disappointed.

Check out our picks for the best new movies to stream in October 2023 below.

“The Faculty” Miramax Films

Peacock – Oct. 1

One of the most underrated movies of the 1990’s, “The Faculty” was an attempt by Dimension to replicate the success of “Scream,” which they had released two years earlier and had become a sensation.

A late-release awards contender can move through Oscar season like a cat. It crouches low, waiting patiently for the right moment to pounce.

With the deployment of a skillful campaign, yet-unscreened films waiting in the wings — notably “The Color Purple,” “The Iron Claw” and “Napoleon” — might execute the perfect strike, catching established front-runners like “Oppenheimer” and “Killers of the Flower Moon” by surprise.

Throughout the expanded best picture era (post-2009), second- and third-quarter release dates have been the sweet spot for eventual Academy winners. Memorable examples are 2009’s “The Hurt Locker” (May) and last year’s “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (April). As October draws to a close, few of the contenders initially screened on the fall festival circuit have been critical flops. That means upcoming prospects hope to break into a race already stacked with two dozen worthy candidates.

Read: Variety’s Awards Circuit for the latest Oscars predictions in all categories.

by Earl Jackson

For years lesbian feminist film scholarship entailed archeological detective work, most notably excavating the subtexts of Rebecca (Alfred Hitchcock 1940) and The Haunting (Robert Wise 1963). In a peculiar reversal, I am going to try a similar dive into a film to salvage its male homosexuality. While Rebecca and The Haunting may have repressed latent desires under a gothic mood piece, Marry My Dead Body ( harbors a sexual ambivalence within a blatant coming out wake. In doing this, I am actually not faulting the film but rather the limitations on sexual legibility under even the most seemingly benign, apparently inclusive heteronormative social order. Moreover, while exposing what the film cannot do, I want to underscore what it does beautifully: it dramatizes as a default aspect of contemporary life, a kind of habituated melancholia interrupted by an intimacy that at first seems like an assault.

The basic plot is actually...

If you purchase an independently reviewed product or service through a link on our website, Variety may receive an affiliate commission.

Less than two months after its release in theaters, “The Meg 2: The Trench” is diving into the streaming world. The big-budget sequel arrives on Max on Sept. 29.

The film, about a murderous 80-foot prehistoric shark, is directed by “Rebecca” helmer Ben Wheatley, who takes the reins from Jon Turteltaub. Turteltaub directed the first installment of the franchise, which took $530 million worldwide. Jason Statham reprises his role in the sequel, which also stars Wu Jing, Cliff Curtis, Sienna Guillory, Skyler Samuels, Page Kennedy, Shuya Sophia Cai and Sergio Peris-Mencheta. Li Bingbing, who led “The Meg” opposite Statham, is not a part of the sequel.

In order to stream the film, you’ll have to sign up for a Max account, with subscriptions starting at $9.99/Month. You can also access...

There are a whole lot of things that Robert Redford is famous for: acting, directing, co-founding the Sundance Film Festival, being incredibly handsome, even running Hydra from within the United States government ... the list goes on and on and on. He became a silver screen icon in classic films like "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," "The Way We Were," "The Sting," "Three Days of the Condor," "The Natural," "Sneakers," and "Captain America: The Winter Soldier." He even won an Academy Award for directing the acclaimed 1980 drama "Ordinary People."

But in spite of all that there's one thing that Robert Redford is not famous for, and that's his tireless work in the horror genre. That's because, despite an acting career that spanned 60 years, he never really made any horror films. You'd have to go way back to 1962 to find Redford's last real brush with the supernatural, but it's well worth the journey.

Saltburn, the second film written and directed by Emerald Fennell — three years after Promising Young Woman, for which she won the best original screenplay Oscar — had its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival’s Palm Theatre on Thursday evening. And the picture, which Amazon plans to put into limited theatrical release on Nov. 24, and then open wide on Dec. 1, certainly left people talking.

A pitch-black comedy packed with sex, violence and music, like Fennell’s first film, Saltburn, which is set in the first decade of this century, chronicles the efforts of one young Oxford student (Barry Keoghan, an Oscar nominee earlier this year for The Banshees of Inisherin) to ingratiate himself into the life of another (Euphoria’s Jacob Elordi). The latter invites the former to spend time with his extremely wealthy family — including his mother (Rosamund Pike), father (Richard E. Grant) and sister (Alison Oliver) — at their mansion,...

Streaming services shake up their catalogs every month, but few rounds of TV and film musical chairs tend to be as rewarding as the ones that take place each fall. That's because we're entering spooky season, a time in which horror fans attempt to tackle ambitious watchlists and scaredy-cats dip their toes into the horror waters in the spirit of all things autumnal.

In keeping with this tradition, a large chunk of the movies making their way to Max (formerly HBO Max) this September are, if not outright scary, at least vaguely within the boundaries of the horror genre. Sure, there are some comedy classics ("Friday"), historical epics ("Gangs of New York"), and brand new docuseries ("Megan Thee Stallion vs. Tory Lanez: Five Shots") worth tuning into, but for my money, nearly all the best Max picks next month fall under the Halloween watchlist-adjacent umbrella.

You shouldn't have to wade...

It takes Rebecca a near-death experience to appreciate the perks of city life and the convenience of having neighbors at arm’s length. And Trapped In The Cabin does take its sweet time, prolonging the torment for the celebrated romance novelist looking to reconnect with her muse in the snowy countryside. For a pick from the dedicated assortment of thrillers, Lifetime makes you feel no shortage of Trapped In The Cabin brews a nifty concoction of terror and betrayal with an isolated woman caught up in the thick of it all. Here’s how Rebecca’s nefarious stay goes in the cabin that was supposed to help her loosen up:

Spoilers Ahead

Plot Synopsis: What Happens In The Film?

The relentless meetings and interviews have understandably gotten Rebecca sick and tired of her life in the city as a bestselling author of romance novels. And she doesn’t have to...

This month marks four years since it was announced that Ben Wheatley, whose latest film Meg 2: The Trench is in theatres now (you can read our review at This Link and check out our interview with Wheatley Here), would be writing, directing, and executive producing Generation Z, a “hilarious, frightening, and political” series that would consist of six hour-long episodes that would “mix flesh-eating zombies into a story that satirizes how Brexit has divided the UK.” That project didn’t make it into production because of the pandemic shutdown… but now it has been revived, and Wheatley has confirmed that it’s going to be his next project!

During an appearance at an Empire VIP screening of Meg 2: The Trench, Wheatley said (with thanks to Fangoria for the transcription), “What I’m doing next is six hours for Channel 4, [a] TV series, a horror-based thing […] In the same...

Plot: When an evil mining operation unearths prehistoric beasts from the ocean’s depths, including multiple megalodons, rescue diver Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham) must suit up to face the return of an old enemy.

Review: 2018’s The Meg overcame middling reviews (including one from yours truly) to become an unlikely global success at the box office. Like its predecessor, Meg 2: The Trench is based on a novel by author Steve Alten, and what’s exciting to genre fans is that the great Ben Wheatley is behind the camera. For those who may not know his work, Wheatley is widely considered one of the UK’s best genre directors, with him having made Kill List, Sightseers, Free Fire, High Rise and – recently – the Netflix remake of Rebecca. This is different for him because it’s a big-budget event movie. How does it fare compared to the original?

Honestly, it’s a mixed bag.

Ben Wheatley is one of the most unpredictable filmmakers working today. He impressed with his feature debut, the darkly funny "Down Terrace," but took a huge leap when he decided to blend two quintessential British genres, crime flicks and folk horror, with the terrifyingly brilliant "Kill List." Wheatley could've hightailed it for Hollywood on the strength of the latter, but he had different priorities. He bounced from the psychedelic horror of "A Field in England" to an effective adaptation of J.G. Ballard's dystopian "High-Rise" to the pitch-black shoot-em-up "Free Fire." He subsequently took a crack at Daphne du Maurier's "Rebecca," and while he couldn't quite place his distinctive stamp on the material (which Alfred Hitchcock aced with David O. Selznick hanging over his shoulder in his 1940 Best Picture winner), you had to admire his ambition.

Wheatley is an undoubtedly gifted filmmaker, but, film to film, I can't...

‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem’ looks for piece of the action.

Shark sequel Meg 2: The Trench is the first major challenger to the Barbenheimer supremacy, opening in 544 cinemas at the UK-Ireland box office this weekend.

Meg 2 will look to challenge both its Warner Bros stablemate Barbie, and Universal’s Oppenheimer, while benefitting from the surge in audiences those titles have brought in the past fortnight.

The first title, 2018’s The Meg, started with £3.7m also in early August; and ended on a sharp £15.9m.

Jason Statham returns for the sequel, which sees a research team encounter multiple threats...

Of course Ben Wheatley had a monster movie in him.

Before he directed "Meg 2: The Trench," Jason Statham's second "giant prehistoric shark threatens the world" outing, Wheatley proved himself capable of floating between genres with a remarkable ease. Nasty, head-splitting horror movies like "Kill List." Pitch-black comedies like "Sightseers." Impossible literary adaptations like "High-Rise." Slick streaming remakes like "Rebecca." And then there are his memorable episodes of "Doctor Who." It was only a matter of time before he made a massive studio-funded B-movie (a term used here with love) where one of the great modern action heroes goes mano-a-sharko with a beast big enough to devour a boat in a single bite. To call this the natural evolution of one of the most interesting modern filmographies would be an understatement. 

I sat down with Wheatley over Zoom ahead of the film's release. Naturally, we talked about monster movies,...

Find yourself a more interesting career path than director Ben Wheatley's, who's set to release "Meg 2: The Trench" this week. After cutting his teeth on various television shows throughout the aughts (including "Doctor Who"), Wheatley broke out among film circles with 2015's "High-Rise." The Tom Hiddleston-starring satire, perhaps best described as "'Snowpiercer' in a skyscraper," gave us our first real look at the filmmaker's distinct sensibilities when allowed the freedom to truly wild out. His follow-up, "Free Fire," gathered several of the most charismatic actors around for a single-location extended shootout that seemed to provide Wheatley with a blank check to do whatever he wanted next. That turned out to be ... the sequel to Alicia Vikander's "Tomb Raider," of all things.

Fans have remained curious about what Wheatley would've done with such an unexpected franchise play, but that wasn't meant to be as the...

Jon Turteltaub’s 2018 movie The Meg (watch it at This Link) delivered on its promise of being a “Jason Statham vs. a giant shark” adventure – and now director Ben Wheatley’s sequel Meg 2: The Trench is set to reach theatres on August 4th. In a newly released featurette, which you can watch in the embed above, Wheatley says his intention with this film was to make a supercharged sequel with bigger creatures and bigger action… and judging by the footage on display in the featurette, it definitely looks like this follow-up has a change of being better and more exciting than its predecessor.

The screenplay for Meg 2: The Trench has been written by Dean Georgaris, Jon Hoeber, and Erich Hoeber, the same writing team that was on the first film. These films are inspired by a series of novels written by Steve Alten.

Jason Statham is back in...

Meg 2: The Trench, director Ben Wheatley’s sequel to Jon Turteltaub’s 2018 “Jason Statham vs. a giant shark” movie The Meg (watch it at This Link), is set to reach theatres on August 4th – and while this sequel will feature multiple giant sharks, those aren’t the only prehistoric creatures that will be rampaging across the screen. In fact, a newly released promo, which you can check out in the embed above, says that this time “the Megs are just the beginning”. One of the other giant creatures we’ll be seeing in Meg 2: The Trench is an octopus, and you can get a glimpse of some giant octopus action in this promo, including a moment where the octopus gets in a fight with a Meg! A moment that brings to mind the 2009 classic Mega Shark Versus Giant Octopus.

The screenplay for Meg 2: The Trench has been written by Dean Georgaris,...

Meg 2: The Trench, director Ben Wheatley’s sequel to Jon Turteltaub’s 2018 “Jason Statham vs. a giant shark” movie The Meg (watch it at This Link), is set to reach theatres on August 4th – and with that date right around the corner, Warner Bros. has unveiled a new poster for the film… one that features multiple sea creatures lurking beneath unsuspecting swimmers. You can check it out at the bottom of this article.

And if that one doesn’t handle your craving for new Meg 2 promotional art, maybe one of these new posters will:

#Meg2 Meg 2 releases posters for IMAX、Cinity、中国巨幕、Dolby、MX4D and Wanos pic.twitter.com/hNu7MXFPvp

— Meg 2: the trench (@Latteeaaee) July 17, 2023

The screenplay for Meg 2: The Trench has been written by Dean Georgaris, Jon Hoeber, and Erich Hoeber, the same writing team that was on the first film. These films are inspired...

In Alice Broughton’s tense literary drama “The Lesson,” Richard E. Grant plays one of Britain’s most noted authors, J.M. Sinclair, who hasn’t put out a book in years. He decides to mentor aspiring novelist Liam (Daryl McCormack) after he’s hired as a tutor for his college-bound son Bertie (Stephen McMillan), but the power dynamic between them soon shifts.

Ahead of the film’s limited theatrical release on Friday, TheWrap chatted about with the Oscar-nominated “Can You Ever Forgive Me” actor about his narcissistic character — who would never watch anything as “squalid” as Grant’s breakout indie “Withnail & I” — and how it’s a little like Alfred Hitchcock’s “Rebecca.”

TheWrap: You play a famous writer who’s quite mercurial and manipulative. How would you describe him?

Richard E. Grant: Self-entitled old literary lion who is facing writer’s block.

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‘Based on a True Story...

Upon taking the reins of the Neuchatel Intl. Fantastic Film Festival (Nifff) last year, incoming artistic director Pierre-Yves Walder marked his first edition with Scream Queer, a thematic retrospective that explored the thorny and thrillingly diverse forms of queer representation in genre fare. Now building on the success of that well-received program, the Nifff director wanted to deliver a sequel of sorts.

“We want to continue last year’s investigations and to take our thematic journeys a step further,” Walder explains. “You could say that this focus will continue to ask and answer the same questions with a slightly different emphasis.”

And so here comes Female Trouble, a 20-film, century-spanning spotlight built on a French play-on-words that blurs gender and genre. Starting with Mario Roncoroni’s silent serial “Filibus,” which mixed sci-fi motifs with gender-fluidity and lesbian desire all the way back in 1915, and on through Jacques Tourneur’s “Cat People...

Exclusive: Emma Appleton is among the cast leading a currently untitled indie British folk horror from debut feature filmmaker Dean Puckett, which has just wrapped production on the southwest coast of England.

Appleton leads the cast, which is rounded out by Jodhi May, Lewis Gribben, Barney Harris, Oliver Maltman, James Swanton, and Toby Stephens. The film is produced by Rebecca Wolff of Grasp the Nettle Films and Jude Goldrei of Lunar Lander Films. Logline reads: When Magpie’s husband dies in mysterious circumstances, a brutal witch-hunt threatens to tear apart an isolated religious community.

Production took place on Cornwall’s Bodmin Moor, an expansive rocky moorland. The Cornish region has a long and rich history of horror filmmaking. Alfred Hitchcock’s second du Maurier adaptation Rebecca is set in Cornwall, and more recently, the region’s distinct landscape feature heavily in the work...