Here are some of the upcoming films from directors whose recent work we have loved. Some are coming out this year, others haven’t started filming yet (and there’s still room for the money guys to say no!) In any case, here’s a smorgasbord of (hopefully) upcoming goodness – alphabetically, by director.
Babak Anvari — untitled Cloverfield sequel
Hallow Road confirmed what Under the Shadow already suggested: Anvari is working at a level where the project almost doesn’t matter. This is a direct sequel to Matt Reeves’s 2008 original, written by Joe Barton, produced by J.J. Abrams at Bad Robot for Paramount. Still in development, still secretive… the franchise has always kept things dark until very late, by design. Is the world ready for another Cloverfield? Well, we loved the divisive Wounds, too, so we’re definitely #TeamAnvari.
Ari Aster — Scapegoat
Announced at A24 in May, starring Scarlett Johansson, plot completely unknown. We didn’t warm to Eddington the way much of the critical consensus did, but Scapegoat finds Aster back in a tighter register — one film with one star and no logline. The title is doing work. If the casting is as considered as it usually is, this could settle some arguments.
Sean Baker — Ti Amo!
Baker describes it as a love letter to the Italian sex comedies of the 1960s and 70s. After Anora swept the awards season, he could have gone anywhere. The fact that he chose this — a specific, historically literate genre homage — is exactly the kind of decision that makes you trust a filmmaker. Warner Bros. Clockwork releasing worldwide in 2027.
Brady Corbet — The Origin of the World
A four-hour, NC-17, 70mm epic about Chinese immigration and Northern California’s economy, from the 19th century to the present, with the 1970s at its centre. Corbet has said it was inspired by The Texas Chain Saw Massacre — not in genre terms but in textural American dread. This is so obviously the right follow-up to The Brutalist that it barely needs saying. Summer 2026 shoot targeted; 2027 release likely.
Nuri Bilge Ceylan — Pale Sun
Shooting this summer in Istanbul and along the Aegean coast. Arte France co-production. No cast, no plot, no release date. A new Ceylan is in motion. About Dry Grasses set a bar that will make this one of the most scrutinised festival premieres of 2027.
Brandon Cronenberg — Dragon
Currently in production in Canada. A space horror about alien lifeforms whose biochemistry is harvested as an opium-like drug, co-written with Marvel Comics writer Dan Abnett. Possessor and Infinity Pool established Cronenberg as one of the most rigorous body horror minds working; a leap to deep space feels unexpected and therefore correct. Post-production runs into early 2027.
Audrey Diwan — The Marriage Portrait
In April, Diwan said she wants to shoot Maggie O’Farrell’s 2022 Renaissance Florence novel within the next year. Element Pictures and Wildside producing, Film4 in development. The book follows a 16th-century duchess who realises her husband intends to kill her. Happening was a masterpiece of formal control and slow-building dread; this material is well within her range. Early days, but looking essential.
Greta Gerwig — Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew
The most contested entry here. A $200M Netflix adaptation of C.S. Lewis with Meryl Streep and Daniel Craig shouldn’t on paper produce much anticipation. But Barbie showed Gerwig can navigate a property without being consumed by it, and The Magician’s Nephew — the creation myth of Narnia, all cosmology and moral weight — is the right book for her. Theatrical February 12, 2027; Netflix April 2.
Luca Guadagnino — Artificial
Yes, it’s an OpenAI biopic. Yes, Andrew Garfield plays Sam Altman. Written by Simon Rich, scored by Damon Albarn, directed by the person who made Challengers and reinvented Suspiria. Amazon MGM pushed it into early 2027 to avoid Sorkin’s own tech industry film.
Andrew Haigh — A Long Winter
Shot last autumn in Calgary. Tóibín adaptation: an Irish woman leaves for 1950s Barcelona and falls in love with a Spanish Civil War veteran. Haigh working from Tóibín — two artists operating in the same register of quiet grief and unspoken need — is an obvious match in the best sense.
Charlie Kaufman — Later The War
Kaufman’s fourth feature as director has been in the works for years. Now it has a cast (Channing Tatum, Tessa Thompson, Patsy Ferran), a Cyprus shoot in 2027, and sales through The Veterans (announced at Cannes market). Adapted from a short story by Iddo Gefen. This is the most information we’ve ever had about a Kaufman film this far out and it’s still very little. Committed regardless.
Damian McCarthy — untitled haunted house horror
Hokum was the best horror film of the year so far. McCarthy is already writing the next one, described only as the “ultimate haunted house horror movie.” The trajectory from Caveat to Oddity to Hokum is steep, and his command of classical psychological dread is without peer in current Irish horror. No date, no cast.
Osgood Perkins — The Young People
Currently shooting in Vancouver with Lola Tung, Nico Parker and Nicole Kidman. Neon releasing in 2026. Plot is under wraps but the script’s first page references The Old Ones, which is the kind of detail Perkins plants deliberately. Given what he does with inherited dread and psychological pressure, Lovecraftian territory feels like a natural next step.
Halina Reijn — Please
Babygirl was sophisticated erotic filmmaking that the discourse flattened into a talking point. Please — again A24, with Gracie Abrams and Tom Burke — has no synopsis yet, and Reijn’s instincts about power and desire are consistent enough that arriving blind seems preferable. In production now.
Alice Rohrwacher — Three Incestuous Sisters
Currently shooting. An adaptation of Audrey Niffenegger’s graphic novel, co-written with Ottessa Moshfegh, reportedly near-silent, shot by Hélène Louvart. The cast (Dakota Johnson, Saoirse Ronan, Jessie Buckley, Josh O’Connor, Mick Jagger) reads like a provocation before a frame has been seen. After La Chimera, Rohrwacher can do whatever she likes with our trust. Target: Cannes 2027.
Martin Scorsese — untitled Hawaii mob film
Still contingent on Disney/20th Century greenlighting after the current script rewrite, but the elements are considerable: DiCaprio and Dwayne Johnson as rivals in the 1960s–70s Hawaiian criminal underworld, Emily Blunt, a $200M budget, and a director whose crime films define the form. If this gets made in the next two years, nothing else on this list comes close.
More news on these projects as we get it…