Filmmaker Nicolas Curcio is riding an incredible run after winning last year’s inaugural Fantastic Pitches competition. He brought his small-budget horror film Play House to this year’s festival and earned glowing reviews from early critics.
Major Seven-Figure Studio Acquisition
Building on that fantastic momentum, Focus Features and Blumhouse-Atomic Monster officially acquired the distribution rights for a 2027 release. According to Deadline, the distribution deal closed in the seven-figure range. As a result, Deadline reports the deal values the movie at least ten times its modest $100,000 production budget.
Unsettling Analog Horror Premise
Co-written by Curcio and Kirby Gladstein, the film follows a desperate young man. He tries to reclaim his past by renovating a crumbling house in a last-ditch effort to win back his ex-girlfriend. But his attempt at reconciliation takes a sinister turn when he stumbles upon a collection of forgotten VHS tapes. The tapes contain episodes of a strange, unaired television show from decades past. However, as he grows increasingly fixated on the footage, the dark history of the abandoned series surfaces. Slowly, it bleeds into his physical reality and threatens to destroy both him and his final chance at love.
Tapping into Found Footage Nostalgia
Starring Will Harrison, Jessica Sula, Jordan Gonzalez, and James Urbaniak, the film digs into the world of analog horror. Rather than chasing viral trends, the creative team crafted the story around deep personal connections to forgotten media. Expect this rising horror sensation to terrify audiences when it hits theaters in 2027.
A Thriving Subgenre in 2026
The film arrives alongside several other major titles redefining retro, lost-media terror this year. A24 brought Kane Parsons’ highly anticipated The Backrooms adaptation to theaters, turning liminal spaces and corrupted video formats into a massive box-office hit. Meanwhile, Buddy, which also features a twisted children’s show, hits digital on October 13.
Play House isn’t the only movie to surface at NYCC; Blumhouse Atomic Monster announced two new films, Something is Killing the Children and Molepeople.
While we wait for the full Play House trailer, the first clip gives you a taste of the horrors to come. Watch it below.
