August
“One Night Only”
“One Night Only” has a strangely discomforting premise: two strangers try to find someone to sleep with on the one night of the year when premarital sex is legal (yeah, it’s a weird dystopian world setting, apparently). Callum Turner and Monica Barbaro star, with Will Gluck (“Anyone But You,” “Friends With Benefits”), master of the modern-day romantic comedy, directing. The best version of this idea would not just turn the premise into a chase for sex, but into a comedy about law, shame, desire, and the ridiculous social rituals people create around permission.
Premiere Date: August 7, 2026, via Universal Pictures.
“Teenage Sex And Death At Camp Miasma”
From surrealist indie auteur Jane Schoenbrun (“I Saw The TV Glow”), “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” sounds like a fake movie playing in the background of another movie, which is part of its charm. Hannah Einbinder stars as a young director trying to resurrect the long-running Camp Miasma slasher franchise after years of bad sequels and fading fandom. When she visits the reclusive star of the original film, played by Gillian Anderson, the two descend into a world of blood, desire, fear, and delirium. Eva Victor, Jack Haven, Quintessa Swindell, Patrick Fischler, and Zach Cherry also co-star, making this sound like a self-aware genre object with actual bite.
Premiere Date: August 7, 2026, via MUBI.
“Late Fame”
Kent Jones returns to narrative filmmaking with “Late Fame,” adapted by Samy Burch from Arthur Schnitzler’s novella. Willem Dafoe stars as a once-forgotten New York poet whose old collection is rediscovered by a younger literary circle, with Greta Lee as an actress who draws him into the intoxicating glow of delayed recognition. Jones’ criticism, programming, and documentary work have long circled questions of artistic life, memory, and legacy, and “Late Fame” sounds like a compact, adult drama about what happens when attention arrives after the moment has passed.
Premiere Date: August 7, 2026, via Magnolia Pictures.
“The End of Oak Street”
David Robert Mitchell returns to high-concept genre territory with “The End of Oak Street,” starring Anne Hathaway, Ewan McGregor, Maisy Stella, and Christian Convery. The premise begins with a mysterious cosmic event that tears Oak Street out of suburbia and transports the entire neighborhood to an unknown destination, forcing the Platt family to survive together in an unrecognizable landscape. Mitchell’s best work has dealt in dread spreading through ordinary spaces: “It Follows” turned suburbia into a cursed map, while “Under the Silver Lake” pushed Los Angeles into paranoid pop mystery. “The End of Oak Street” sounds like a larger-scale version of that instinct, ripping an ordinary American setting out of context.
Premiere Date: August 14, 2026, via Warner Bros.
“The Rivals of Amziah King”
“The Rivals of Amziah King” brings Matthew McConaughey back into a rich, oddball Southern-crime register, playing a charismatic, musically gifted figure who runs a honey-making operation in rural Oklahoma while leading a bluegrass-playing band of misfits. Kurt Russell, Cole Sprouse, Owen Teague, Rob Morgan, and Tony Revolori co-star, with Andrew Patterson directing. Patterson’s “The Vast of Night” was a small miracle of mood and control, built from voice, rhythm, and atmosphere rather than scale. This follow-up sounds like a crime picture, family drama, and regional fable folded together. (Read our review).
Premiere Date: August 14, 2026, via Black Bear.
![‘The Rivals Of Amziah King’ Review: Matthew McConaughey & Angelina LookingGlass Are Magnificent In Andrew Patterson’s Western Wonder [SXSW]](https://cdn.theplaylist.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/11103032/the-rivals-of-amziah-king-319857_c200b9-1024x594.jpg)
“The Wrong Girls”
Kristen Stewart and Alia Shawkat star in “The Wrong Girls” as two financially struggling friends whose weed-heavy routine is disrupted when they are mistaken for someone else. The cast also includes Kumail Nanjiani, Tony Hale, LaKeith Stanfield, Zack Fox, and Dylan Meyer, with Seth Rogen among the producers. Mistaken-identity comedies can be flimsy, but this one has an appealingly scuzzy setup of two underemployed women with minimal resources who are suddenly pushed into complications they are not equipped to handle.
Premiere Date: August 14, 2026, via NEON.
“Insidious: Out of the Further”
“Insidious: Out of the Further” keeps one of modern horror’s most durable supernatural franchises alive by shifting the focus to Gemma, a young mother played by Amelia Eve, who discovers she can travel into The Further, the purgatorial realm at the center of the series. Lin Shaye, Brandon Perea, Maisie Richardson-Sellers, Sam Spruell, and Laura Gordon co-star, with Jacob Chase directing. The twist is that Gemma does not merely enter The Further—she can bring things back. That is a strong escalation for a franchise built on haunted family histories and demons waiting in the dark.
Premiere Date: August 21, 2026, via Sony Pictures.
“Mutiny”
Jason Statham is framed for murder and has to uncover an international conspiracy in “Mutiny,” which is exactly the kind of movie the action star seems to crave. Statham plays a man who witnesses the killing of his billionaire industrialist boss and becomes the fall guy. Jean-François Richet directs, with Adrian Lester, Roland Møller, and Arnas Fedaravicius among the cast. Richet already handled contained action pressure well in “Plane,” and “Mutiny” sounds like fugitive-thriller momentum without franchise bloat.
Premiere Date: August 21, 2026, via Lionsgate.
“Coyote vs. ACME”
“Coyote vs. ACME” may arrive with more offscreen baggage than almost any family comedy in recent memory. Still, the premise remains irresistible: after decades of being blown up, flattened, tricked, and hurled off cliffs by faulty ACME products, Wile E. Coyote finally sues. Will Forte plays a billboard accident lawyer, John Cena plays a slick corporate counsel, and Dave Green (“Happily”) directs from a script credited to Samy Burch, James Gunn, Jeremy Slater, and others. The film became a symbol of corporate write-off culture after Warner Bros. Discovery nearly buried it. Cartoon violence enters the legal system? We’re there.
Premiere Date: August 28, 2026, via Ketchup Entertainment.
“The Dog Stars”
Ridley Scott directs “The Dog Stars,” an adaptation of Peter Heller’s post-apocalyptic novel starring Jacob Elordi, Josh Brolin, Margaret Qualley, and Guy Pearce. The story is set years after a superflu has wiped out much of humanity, following a man who lives in an abandoned airport hangar with his dog, flies the perimeter in a Cessna, and mourns the wife and world he lost. A distant radio transmission suggests something better may exist beyond his small survival zone. Scott has spent his career moving between empire, ruin, survival, and the machinery of men under pressure, and this gives him a quieter post-apocalyptic register than the genre usually allows.
Premiere Date: August 28, 2026, via 20th Century Studios.
“Idiots”
Dave Franco and O’Shea Jackson Jr. star in “Idiots,” a dark road comedy written and directed by Macon Blair, who previously directed “I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore.” Franco and Jackson play two screwups hired to transport a wealthy, troubled teenager, played by Mason Thames, to rehab. The cast also includes Kiernan Shipka, Nicholas Braun, Peter Dinklage, Killer Mike, and Blair. The film premiered at Sundance as “The Shitheads” before Independent Film Company retitled it for release (our review).
Premiere Date: August 28, 2026, via Independent Film Company
August Honorable Mentions:
“Super Troopers 3” (August 7, Searchlight Pictures — Jay Chandrasekhar, Kevin Heffernan); “Fall 2” (August 7, Lionsgate — Harriet Slater, Arsema Thomas); “Ice Cream Man” (August 7, Iconic Events — Eli Roth); “The Brink of War” (August 14, Angel Studios — Jeff Daniels, Jared Harris, J.K. Simmons); “Spa Weekend” (August 21, Black Bear — Isla Fisher, Leslie Mann, Anna Faris); “Cliffhanger” (August 28, Row K — Lily James, Jaume Collet-Serra); “Colony” (August 28, Well Go USA — Gianna Jun, Koo Kyo-hwan); “Filipiñana” (August 28 — Rafael Manuel); “Legend of the White Dragon” (August 28, Well Go USA — Jason David Frank).
