Fall is almost here, which means Halloween is just around the corner and that means horror movie season is upon us. This fall has something for everyone, from family-friendly spoopy movies to the downright terrifying. James Wan returns with a brand-new original horror movie, some hugely anticipated horror franchise sequels (and one franchise reboot) are on the way, and a whole parade of classic movie monsters are returning to grace our screens again.
Here’s every horror movie and special event hitting theaters in Fall 2021.
SEPTEMBER
Malignant
Release Date: Friday, September 10
Cast: Annabelle Wallis, Maddie Hasson, George Young, Michole Briana White, Jacqueline McKenzie
Director: James Wan
James Wan is getting back to his original horror roots with Malignant. A woman named Madison suddenly begins to be paralyzed with terrifyingly realistic and gruesome nightmares of people being murdered. However, her nightmare turns into a waking horror when she realizes the nightmares she’s having are actually happening in real life. It forces her to uncover the repressed memories of her troubled childhood that might hold the key to what’s happening to her now.
Labyrinth 35th Anniversary (Three-Night Event)
Release Date: Sunday, September 12, Monday, September 13 & Wednesday, September 15
Cast: Jennifer Connelly, David Bowie
Director: Jim Henson
Fathom Events is celebrating the late Jim Henson’s birthday with a special event screening series of Labyrinth. It’s not exactly horror, but it definitely has some dark horror elements to it, so we’re including it on the list. Teenager Sarah is frustrated when she’s forced to babysit her baby stepbrother, Toby, yet again giving up one of her weekend nights. Impulsively, she wishes for goblins to spirit him away–only to discover that goblins are real and Toby has disappeared. Sarah must enter a fantasy realm ruled by the Goblin King (played by David Bowie in his prime) and navigate the impossible, ever-changing labyrinth to get to his castle. The Labyrinth 35th anniversary screening will also be accompanied by two featurettes: First, Jennifer Connelly and the Henson family will discuss Jim Henson’s legacy in “The Henson Legacy,” then “Center for Puppetry Arts” which will feature over 100 puppets from Labyrinth and the Jim Henson Collection.
Prisoners of the Ghostland
Release Date: Friday, September 17
Cast: Nicolas Cage, Sofia Boutella, Nick Cassavetes, Bill Moseley, Tak Sakaguchi, Yuzuka Nakaya, Takato Yonemoto, Charles Glover, Jeffrey Rowe, Narisa Suzuki
Director: Sion Sono
West meets East in Prisoners of the Ghostland. When bank robber Hero finds himself jailed in the frontier city of Samurai Town, he’s offered a chance at freedom by The Governor, a wealthy local warlord. However, Hero’s freedom comes with strings attached. He’s tasked with tracking down The Governor’s adopted granddaughter, Bernice, and bringing her back. With only five days to find her and being locked into a suit that will blow up if he’s not successful, Hero must travel into the dark, supernatural realm known as the Ghostland and break a curse in order to save Bernice.
Carrie 45th Anniversary (Two-Night Event)
Release Date: Sunday, September 26 & Wednesday, September 29
Cast: Sissy Spacek, Piper Laurie, Amy Irving, John Travolta, William Katt, Nancy Allen, Betty Buckley
Director: Brian De Palma
The classic movie based on the classic Stephen King novel lives on the big screen once again for the Carrie 45th anniversary event. Carrie is an odd, awkward high school outcast who is painfully shy, completely naive, and who no idea she has incredible powers of telekinesis. Trapped in a home with a psychotic, religious fanatic mother and tormented mercilessly at school by the popular kids, Carrie unleashes hell on Prom Night when a prank goes too far and she’s humiliated in front of the entire school. No one is safe from her rage and the town will never be the same again.
OCTOBER
The Addams Family 2
Release Date: Friday, October 1
Cast: Charlize Theron, Oscar Isaac, Chloë Grace Moretz, Nick Kroll, Bette Midler, Snoop Dogg, Bill Hader, Javon ‘Wanna’ Walton
Director: Greg Tiernan
Everyone’s favorite creepy, kooky, scary, spooky family is back in The Addams Family 2. In the sequel, Morticia and Gomez are distraught that Wednesday and Pugsley are growing up and have no interest in good old-fashioned family time. To bring the family back together, they decide to cram Wednesday, Pugsley, Uncle Fester and the rest into their family camper for a miserable family vacation. Their cross-country adventure finds them having all sorts of spooky run-ins with strange oddballs and their famous cousin.
Dracula & Frankenstein Double Feature (One Night Only)
Release Date: Saturday, October 2
Cast: Dracula – Bela Lugosi, Helen Chandler, David Manners, Dwight Frye, Edward Van Sloan, Herbert Bunston, Frances Dade; Frankenstein – Boris Karloff, Colin Clive, Mae Clarke, John Boles, Edward Van Sloan, Dwight Frye, Frederick Kerr
Directors: Tod Browning (Dracula); James Whale (Frankenstein)
Universal’s two most iconic monsters are back in the original 1930s classics Dracula and Frankenstein. Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff are both renowned almost 100 years later for their portrayals of Dracula and Frankenstein’s Monster, respectively. In Dracula, Bram Stoker’s novel tells the story of the suave but otherworldly Count Dracula, who pulls Jonathan Harker, his friends, and his fiancée into a terrifying nightmare when Dracula reveals himself to be an ancient, bloodsucking monster. And Mary Shelley’s novel tells the tragic tale of Victor Frankenstein and his monster, a creation brought to life through science but forever doomed to be alone and shunned.
The Evil Dead 40th Anniversary (One Night Only)
Release Date: Thursday, October 7
Cast: Bruce Campbell, Ellen Sandweiss, Betsy Baker, Theresa Tilly, Richard DeManincor
Director: Sam Raimi
Chaos is always close when the Necronomicon and the Deadites are around . Five friends travel to an isolated cabin in the woods for a weekend away from college. But when they find a strange book in the basement and a tape recording of incantations from the book, they accidentally summon a host of demonic entities with the powers of possession. The college students are gradually possessed one by one and it becomes a bloody war for survival in the woods in the 40th anniversary of The Evil Dead, Sam Raimi’s cult classic.
Scream 25th Anniversary (Two-Night Event)
Release Date: Sunday, October 10 & Monday, October 11
Cast: Neve Campbell, David Arquette, Courteney Cox, Matthew Lillard, Skeet Ulrich, Rose McGowan, Drew Barrymore, Jamie Kennedy, Henry Winkler, Lawrence Hecht
Director: Wes Craven
The Scream 25th anniversary event celebrates the movie that revolutionized the slasher franchise in 1996, upending tropes and becoming an instant classic with its dark metahumor and upending of horror movie tropes. When their small town of Woodsboro is hit with a string of grisly murders, teenager Sidney Prescott and her friends find themselves the target of the masked killer. They try to use the “rules” of horror movies to stay alive, but when they start dropping like flies, it’s down to Sidney to be the Final Girl and unmask the killer once and for all. This special event also comes with vintage behind-the-scenes interviews with legendary horror filmmaker Wes Craven and the cast.
Halloween Kills
Release Date: Friday, October 15
Cast: Jamie Lee Curtis, Judy Greer, Andi Matichak, Anthony Michael Hall, Nick Castle, James Jude Courtney, Charles Cyphers, Kyle Richards, Robert Longstreet
Director: David Gordon Green
The next chapter in the four-decade-long Halloween franchise is back with Halloween Kills. The action picks up right after 2018’s Halloween ends, with Laurie rushed to the hospital with the grievous injuries she sustained during the final battle she believes finally killed her lifelong tormentor, Michael Myers. But Michael manages to free himself from Laurie’s trap and resumes his killing. As Laurie fights her pain and prepares to defend herself against him, she inspires all of Haddonfield to rise up against their unstoppable monster. Old meets new as the Strode women join a group of other survivors of Michael’s first rampage who decide to take matters into their own hands, forming a vigilante mob that sets out to hunt Michael down and end it for good.
The Silence of the Lambs 30th Anniversary (Two-Night Event)
Release Date: Sunday, October 17 & Wednesday, October 20
Cast: Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, Scott Glenn, Ted Levine, Anthony Heald, Brooke Smith, Diane Baker, Kasi Lemmons, Charles Napier, Roger Corman
Director: Jonathan Demme
“Hello, Clarice.” With those two words, Hannibal Lecter cemented himself in movie history as one of the most iconic villains ever put to screen. The Silence of the Lambs 30th anniversary event brings Lecter and Clarice Starling back together again for a new generation to see for the first time. When a serial killer known only as Buffalo Bill conducts a string of killings, rookie FBI agent and criminal profiler Clarice Starling is sent to employ the help of incarcerated Hannibal “The Cannibal” Lecter, believing they need to use a serial killer to catch a serial killer. The cannibal doctor is fascinated with Clarice, and as she gets sucked further into the case, his mind games start to undermine her as she’s faced with her own demons and a real-life evil so dark it almost kills her.
Last Night in Soho
Release Date: Friday, October 22
Cast: Anya Taylor-Joy, Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie, Matt Smith, Terence Stamp, Diana Rigg, Rita Tushingham, Michael Ajao, Synnøve Karlsen, James Phelps, Andrew Bicknell
Director: Edgar Wright
In acclaimed director Edgar Wright’s psychological thriller, Last Night in Soho, Eloise, an aspiring fashion designer, is mysteriously able to enter the 1960s where she encounters a dazzling wannabe singer, Sandie. But the glamour is not all it appears to be and the dreams of the past start to crack and splinter into something far darker.
RiffTrax Live: Amityville 4: The Evil Escapes (One Night Only)
Release Date: Tuesday, October 26
Cast: Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett
The former trio of MST3K jokers return for another live event, this time to skewer the fourth Amityville movie in RiffTrax Live: Amityville 4: The Evil Escapes. If your idea of celebrating Halloween includes more laughs than screams, there’s no better way to warm up for the holiday weekend than joining Mike, Bill, and Kevin as they skewer one of the worst movies in the Amityville franchise – and possibly ever.
Antlers
Release Date: Friday, October 29
Cast: Keri Russell, Jesse Plemons, Jeremy T. Thomas, Graham Greene, Scott Haze, Rory Cochrane, Amy Madigan, Cody Davis
Director: Scott Cooper
In Antlers, a small-town Oregon teacher and her brother, the local sheriff, discover that a young boy is harboring a dangerous secret with frightening consequences. When strange things start happening around the town, they become convinced he’s hiding a supernatural creature in his house, and things are about to turn sinister and deadly.
The Invisible Man & The Wolf Man Double Feature (One Night Only)
Release Date: Saturday, October 30
Cast: The Invisible Man – Claude Rains, Gloria Stuart, William Harrigan, Henry Travers, Una O’Connor, Forrester Harvey; The Wolf Man – Claude Rains, Lon Chaney, Jr., Bela Lugosi, Warren William, Ralphy Bellamy, Patric Knowles, Evelyn Ankers
Directors: James Whale (The Invisible Man); George Waggner (The Wolf Man)
In the second double feature of Universal’s classic monsters, The Wolf Man and The Invisible Man return to terrorize. In The Invisible Man, H.G. Wells’ horrifically existential sci-fi comes to life when Dr. Jack Griffin finds a way to render himself invisible but in doing so, goes murderously insane. Meanwhile, Curt Siodmak’s original screenplay The Wolf Man tells the story of Larry Talbot, who returns to his ancestral home in Wales but gets more than he bargained for when he’s bitten by a werewolf and becomes cursed himself, only to be hunted down by his own father and an angry mob.
NOVEMBER
ParaNorman (One Night Only)
Release Date: Tuesday, October 16
Cast: Kodi Smit-McPhee, Tucker Albrizzi, Anna Kendrick, Casey Affleck, Christopher Mintz-Plasse
Director: Chris Butler, Sam Fell
In the spooky animated comedy ParaNorman, Norman is a misunderstood boy, who is considered an oddball by the rest of the town due to his ability to speak with the dead. But when the town is overrun by zombies, suddenly, Norman becomes the only person who can save everyone. Not only will he have to take on the zombies, but he’ll also have to deal with ghosts, witches, and, worst of all, grown-ups, to save his town from a centuries-old curse. But this young ghoul-whisperer bravely summons up all that makes a hero – courage and compassion – as he finds his paranormal activities pushed to their otherworldly limits.
Ghostbusters: Afterlife
Release Date: Friday, November 19
Cast: Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, Paul Rudd, Bokeem Woodbine, Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray, Sigourney Weaver, Ernie Hudson, Annie Potts
Director: Jason Reitman
The next chapter in the original Ghostbusters universe is here with Jason Reitman’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife. When a single mom and her two kids move to the middle of nowhere after inheriting her eccentric dad’s rundown old Victorian and lands, everything seems awful. But when the kids discover their connection to the original Ghostbusters and the secret legacy their grandfather left behind, it’s suddenly up to them to save everyone when a new supernatural force is awakened.
Resident Evil: Welcome To Raccoon City
Release Date: Friday, November 24
Cast: Kaya Scodelario, Robbie Amell, Hannah John-Kamen, Avan Jogia, Tom Hopper, Lily Gao, Neal McDonough, Donal Logue
Director: Johannes Roberts
A brand-new, fresh take on the Resident Evil video games closes out the fall slate of horror movies. In Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, the once the booming home of pharmaceutical giant Umbrella Corporation, Raccoon City, is now a dying Midwestern town. The company’s exodus left the city a wasteland…with great evil brewing below the surface. When that evil is unleashed, a group of survivors must work together to uncover the truth behind Umbrella and make it through the night.
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