Another holiday week is upon us here in 2023, with this first full week of April culminating with Easter Sunday. And fittingly, a brand new Easter horror movie is on the way this week…
Here’s all the new horror releasing April 4 – April 9, 2023!
For daily reminders about new horror releases, be sure to follow @HorrorCalendar.
Living With Chucky, a Child’s Play documentary that celebrates the entire franchise, is our latest SCREAMBOX release, and it’s now available for streaming beginning today!
Written and directed by Kyra Elise Gardner, daughter of legendary special effects artist Tony Gardner, Living With Chucky looks back at the groundbreaking horror franchise. The documentary details the history of the Child’s Play films by the cast and crew, in addition to Gardner’s relationship with the series and the impact it had on her family.
Gardner, who grew up alongside Chucky the killer doll, seeks out the other families surrounding the Child’s Play films as they recount their experiences working on the ongoing franchise and what it means to be a part of the “Chucky” family. Living With Chucky also shows the still-running franchise’s enduring impact on the evolution of horror.
Living With Chucky enlists the franchise’s mainstays to deliver behind-the-scenes anecdotes and making-of details. Through Brad Dourif, Fiona Dourif, Jennifer Tilly, Alex Vincent, Christine Elise, Billy Boyd, Don Mancini, franchise producer David Kirschner and more, we gain new perspectives on our favorite movies.
From director Nick Kozakis, XYZ Films will be releasing Godless: The Eastfield Exorcism this week, said to be a chilling Australian horror movie. It comes to VOD on Thursday, April 6.
In Godless: The Eastfield Exorcism, “Lara is a woman tormented, torn between science and faith. Pushed by her husband to seek treatment from a congregation of zealots, a ruthless exorcist will try to save her soul by putting an innocent woman through hell.”
Directed by Nick Kozakis from a screenplay by Alexander Angliss-Wilson, the film stars Georgia Eyers, Dan Ewing, Tim Pocock, Rosie Traynor, and Eliza Matengu.
On the TV front, the fifth season of the slasher-based horror anthology series “Slasher” premieres this week, with “Slasher: Ripper” set to debut on Shudder and AMC+ on April 6.
“Slasher: Ripper” takes the franchise back in time to the late 19th century and stars Eric McCormack (Will & Grace) as Basil Garvey, a charismatic tycoon whose success is only rivaled by his ruthlessness, as he oversees a city on the cusp of a new century, and a social upheaval that will see its streets run red with blood.
There’s a killer stalking the mean streets, but instead of targeting the poor and downtrodden like Jack the Ripper, The Widow is meting out justice against the rich and powerful.
The only person standing in the way of this killer is the newly promoted detective, Kenneth Rijkers, whose ironclad belief in justice may wind up being yet another victim of The Widow.
Bloody Disgusting’s SCREAMBOX is preparing a feast for Easter this year, and we’ll be serving up psychological horror film Family Dinner beginning Good Friday, April 7.
In Family Dinner, written and directed by Peter Hengl, a teenager spends the holidays at her aunt’s farm in the hope of getting help to lose weight, but soon after her arrival, she begins to suspect that something is very wrong at this place.
“Easter brings the slow simmer to a roaring boil. Fraught psychological dread explodes in violent horror,” wrote Meagan Navarro out of the Tribeca World Premiere.
“Family Dinner is like watching from afar as Alice begins a slow disturbing descent down the rabbit hole. The momentarily serene mask that Hengl creates quickly falls away revealing how close the monsters from our nightmares might be. This is the kind of film that gets inside you, and just won’t go away,” said Brad Miska, Managing Director of Bloody Disgusting.
Family Dinner is Hengl’s first feature as a director and second as a writer. The film stars Pia Hierzegger (The Ground Beneath My Feet), Michael Pink (Skyfall), Alexander Sladek (Knall Genial), and introduces Nina Katlein.
From Quiver Distribution, You’re Killing Me releases in select theaters and on Digital on Friday, April 7. The film tells the story of prep student Eden Murphy (McKaley Miller).
A week ago, a student at Torrington Prep, Melissa Brown (Kalli Tehranae), went missing. While the police search for her, her classmates are more preoccupied with their own futures — none more than Eden Murphy. She may be the poorest student at Torrington Prep, but she’s got big ambitions. Ever since she was a kid she has dreamed of attending the elite Pennbrooke College. But after learning she’s been waitlisted at the school of her dreams, Eden decides to take drastic action.
With the hope of receiving a letter of recommendation from the wealthy parents of resident alpha bro, and valedictorian, Barrett Schroder (Brice Anthony Heller), Eden hatches a plan. She drags her best friend Zara (Keyara Milliner) along with her and sneaks into his annual legendary “Heaven and Hell” party. Betraying their better judgment, Eden and Zara don sexy wings and skirts and head to the notoriously debaucherous party to cozy up to Schroder.
Unfortunately, Eden realizes that her friend Zara is sloppy drunk. When she brings Zara upstairs to sleep it off, Eden stumbles upon evidence on Schroder’s friend Gooch’s (Brice Anthony Heller) phone that links Schroder to Melissa Brown’s disappearance. Troubled by this discovery, Eden locks herself and Zara in the master bedroom with the phone/evidence. Schroder and his friends realize that she has it and come knocking. Eden demands answers while Schroder insists she’s being drunk and hysterical. Barricaded in the master bedroom with her unconscious friend, Eden searches for a way out.
The night spirals out of control as Schroder and his friends resort to increasingly desperate measures. Soon the game of cat and mouse turns deadly as the teens do everything in their power to protect their bright futures. As the bodies start to pile up, Eden is still trapped and she realizes it’ll take every ounce of courage and wit if she is going to survive this hellish night.
You’re Killing Me features an all-star cast that includes Dermot Mulroney (Scream VI), Anne Heche (I Know What You Did Last Summer), McKaley Miller (Ma), Wil Deusner (She-Hulk), Morgana Van Peebles (Power) and Brice Anthony Heller (Samaritan).
The film is directed by Beth Hanna and Jerren Lauder (The Inhabitant) and is written by Walker Hare (Thorp) and Brad Martocello (To Kill A Cat).
The horror-comedy Summoning Sylvia was released in select theaters last week, and it’ll next be released on at-home VOD outlets on April 7 courtesy of The Horror Collective.
The cast of Summoning Sylvia includes Travis Coles (Superstore), Michael Urie (Younger), Frankie Grande (Henry Danger), Nicholas Logan (I Care a Lot), Troy Iwata (Dash & Lily), Noah Ricketts (American Gods), Sean Grandillo (Scream: The TV Series), Camden Garcia (Station 19), and Veanne Cox (You’ve Got Mail) as the titular specter.
Summoning Sylvia tells the tale of Larry, who has been kidnapped by his three best friends for a bachelor weekend getaway at a haunted house. As they sashay through the dusty corridors, the comrades recount the house’s legend from a hundred years ago: a murderous woman named Sylvia slaughtered her son and buried him beneath the house’s floorboards.
But then Larry remembers that he was supposed to spend the weekend bonding with Harrison, his mysterious future brother-in-law. Horrified at his oversight, Larry invites the army-uniformed, hetero Harrison to join his gaggle’s gaycation, neglecting to run it by his friends. Later, as they hold a high-spirited séance to summon the sinister Sylvia, the group ends up welcoming more houseguests than they bargained for.
Director Monte Light’s new movie Blood Covered Chocolate is said to be a “unique homage to horror classic Nosferatu,” and it’s sinking its teeth into Digital outlets on Friday.
“When a recovering drug-addict named Massimo is bitten by an ancient, shapeshifting monster, he must fight to save his girlfriend Tien from the same bloody fate.”
Michael Klug, Christine Nguyen, Meghan Deanna Smith, Debra Lamb, Helene Udy, Mike Ferguson, and Joe Altieri star in Blood Covered Chocolate, from Terror Films.