That Damned Thing (2026): This short by Christopher Lewis is exactly the kind of grim discovery that’ll keep you up. It’s a lean, mean creature-feature procedural that doesn’t bother with grand explanations, focusing instead on the cold, hard reality of an autopsy gone wrong. Set in a coroner’s inquest, what begins as a routine examination of an inexplicable death quickly spirals into a full-blown crisis. As the facts fail to align and the physical evidence starts pointing to something that defies traditional biology, the morgue feels like it becomes a haunted house. Plus, Lewis plays a smart game with the monster here. He knows the most terrifying beasts are the ones that stay just out of focus for as long as possible.

Hatchlings (2025): Directed by Jahmil Eady, Hatchlings stars a resentful, bored teenager stuck babysitting her half-brother, a kid whose obsession with turtles is bordering on the spectrum. But instead of just a quiet afternoon in the living room, Eady kicks the door open into a vivid, hallucinatory fantasy world. As the brother dives headfirst into his own imagination, he becomes a sea turtle navigating the depths, while his sister is involuntarily cast as a slow-moving tortoise. Somehow, this all forces them to confront their sibling baggage in the most unexpected way possible.

Eternal (2026): Joshua Jeffrey Miller’s Eternal isn’t looking for cheap jump scares; it’s looking for the bottom of a bottle, the end of a rope, and the haunting reality of what happens when a man decides he’s done with the land of the living. We follow a man absolutely hollowed out by grief. He’s not looking for closure. Instead, he’s looking for an exit strategy. In his desperate state, he begins to actively hunt for death, not as a tragedy, but as a bridge. It’s a way to cross over and catch one final glimpse of the loved one he’s lost. This one gets dark.

Pyre (2026): Dylan Miller’s Pyre manages to trade cheap jump scares for the slow-drip dread of a tightening noose. Set in a desolate 17th-century village where the mud is as thick as the religious hysteria, the film is a masterclass in claustrophobic intensity. The story centers on Elspeth, a widowed mother struggling to maintain a quiet existence in a community already on the brink of collapse. Her life is upended when a charismatic, traveling inquisitor arrives. He isn’t the lumbering brute one might expect. Instead, he is polished, soft-spoken and terrifyingly calculated. Under the guise of cleansing the village of unnatural influence, he zeroes in on Elspeth. The film pivots from a period drama into a psychological crucible, pun intended, when the inquisitor presents her with an ultimatum: confess to a crime she didn’t commit to spare her daughter’s life or maintain her innocence and watch the flames consume everything she loves. It is a grim, unrelenting look at how faith can be weaponized for absolute control. A dark story told well.

Ride Pending (2026): Directed by Sam Tiwanak, this has Sara (Elena Vance) making the mistake of pushing her luck on a remote mountain hike. Stranded as the sun starts to dip below the horizon, she fires up an app and summons a ride. Enter Henry. He’s prompt, he’s polite, and he’s driving a car that looks a little too clean for these dirt roads. At first, it’s just awkward small talk. Then, it’s a missed turn. Then, it’s the realization that Henry isn’t following the GPS. As the miles tick away and the interior of the car starts to feel less like a taxi and more like a prison, Sara has to play the ultimate game of cat and mouse. It’s a claustrophobic nightmare that plays out in real-time, focusing on the agonizing transition from uncomfortable passenger to fighting for your life.

The Arcade Attendants (2026): Directed by Corbin W.M. Peek, this is set in the waning days of the arcade golden age and follows a group of underpaid, perpetually bored teenagers running a massive game room. It’s all apathy, cheap pizza and trying to avoid the manager until an ancient, unlabeled cabinet arrives in the back office. Once a few high-score seekers start messing with it, the boundaries between the pixelated world and the strip mall reality start to buckle. Suddenly, the jump scares aren’t just happening in the games. They’re bleeding into the prize counter. I really loved all the supers in this and how much it brings in video game content.

Crossfaded: Thesis Film (2026): Jeffrey Rucker’s Crossfaded is for anyone who’s survived a house party. Jax is a dealer who views the world through a haze of smoke. Brian is a social drinker who just wants to be loved. When they find themselves accidentally locked in the basement, they’re forced to connect with one another. What starts as a standard stoner comedy rapidly devolves into a surrealist chamber piece. As the crossfaded state of the title sets in, the basement starts to feel less like a room and more like a purgatory. The walls seem to close in, the frat-house music upstairs turns into a throb, and these two strangers realize that in a world this superficial, they might be the only two real people left.

Mystic Stylez (2025): Lil’ K, a rapper whose career is currently flatlined at the bottom of the Memphis underground. Tired of playing to empty bars, he turns to an occult ritual to manifest fame and fortune. The payoff is instant. His beats get tighter, the crowds get bigger,and the tracks start climbing the charts. But the price of admission is soul-deep. As Lil’ K’s reality begins to fray, he realizes the sinister forces he invited in aren’t just looking for a feature on his next track. It’s a classic Faustian bargain, but with a trunk-rattling bass line and enough Southern-gothic atmosphere to fill a graveyard. Director Giovanni D. Fleming commissioned local Memphis producers to create original tracks for the film. The music isn’t just background noise. It’s practically a character in the film, with the cursed beats actually changing tempo and pitch as the protagonist’s sanity slips away.

Private I (2024): Directed by Evan Patrick Adam, this film follows a basement-dwelling bellboy (Leo Vance) who spends his nights not just hauling luggage, but cataloging the lives of guests through the lens of a high-end digital camera. He’s the ultimate invisible man, convinced he’s the smartest guy in the hotel until he catches sight of a mysterious, porcelain-faced woman (Sarah Jenkins) checking into the penthouse. His obsession with her leads him down a rabbit hole of conspiracies, hidden identities and shallow graves. But as the investigation deepens, the line between his digital archives and his own reality starts to dissolve. He realizes that the footage he’s been collecting has made him a person of interest in a game he doesn’t fully understand, forcing him to turn the camera on himself.

Knifeman (2025): Horatio Hunt is an IRS agent. He’s a man whose life is defined by audits, spreadsheets and the crushing weight of small-town corruption. He’s the definition of mild-mannered, the guy you’d never notice in a crowded room. But when a shadow organization begins tearing his city apart and the legal system proves too slow to stop them, Horatio stops crunching numbers and starts crunching skulls. Trading his calculator for a collection of high-carbon steel blades, he becomes the city’s most surgical predator. It’sFalling Down meets a slasher flick, where the protagonist is just as terrifying as the villains he’s hunting while also looking vaguely sentai.

You can watch this either in-person or virtually at the Chattanooga Film Festival. For more info, visit the official site.

CHÄIR (2025): Directed by Chris McInroy, just from the title, you know that you’re in the world of IKEA. Carl is an exhausted, everyday guy just looking for a little bit of comfort. He finds it—or thinks he does—in a seemingly innocent high-end chair that appears out of nowhere. However, this isn’t your standard piece of ergonomic office furniture. The moment Carl plants himself, the chair stakes its claim, locking him into a visceral, inescapable embrace. What follows is a battle for survival as the furniture begins to assert dominance in the most violent ways possible. Sometimes, the whole world is against you. Even the chairs.

Beware C*ckblocking Ghosts (2026): Our protagonist is a teen just trying to navigate the social minefield of getting a date for homecoming. She finally lands one, but there’s a massive, ectoplasmic fly in the ointment. Her best friend, who happens to be deceased, has taken up permanent residence in her home. The problem? The ghost is absolutely obsessed with keeping the romance from ever getting off the ground. What begins as supernatural pranks, like flickering lights and slamming doors, quickly escalates into a full-blown, murderously jealous vendetta. Director Alys Murray has really come up with a fun idea here that could be a full-length movie all on its own.

Forever Home (2026): Ashley Wong, you made me cry like a baby. Benson, the three-legged mastiff, spends his days content to watch the world pass by until one day a mysterious dog shows up at his doorstep, followed by many more. Watching those dogs hang out made me so happy, but then they all crossed the rainbow bridge, one by one, leaving behind urns. I have similar ones in my movie room down here. I miss every animal I’ve ever had the privilege to love, and every day, I try to forget how sad it makes me that I don’t have them around. So yes, this is a beautiful, well-made animated film, but also one that I’m getting wet eyes even thinking about.

Wolf Puppy (2026): Directed by Sam Osborn, this short’s protagonist desperately wants to be the biggest dog in the yard. He’s a lonely soul, projecting a tough guy persona to the world while hiding a fragile interior. But the universe has a funny way of stripping the paint off your car, you know? As he starts experiencing hallucinatory visions, he has to learn to navigate the gap between the monster he pretends to be and the man he actually could be.

Red Light Green Light (2025): Directed by Corey Grispo, this asks us to follow a mysterious figure consumed by a singular, obsessive compulsion as he repeatedly slams his fingers down on one red and one green button. The camera doesn’t offer us the comfort of context; it just focuses on the tactile, rhythmic violence of the button pushing being done in rapid, chaotic succession. Soon, we learn why people swear in traffic.

Big Footprints (2025): Jonathan Maxwell Shander’s Big Footprints follows a dedicated squatcher who is dead set on proving the existence of the legendary beast. When the woods start getting a little too big for one man to navigate, he’s forced to recruit the last person on earth he wants to be stuck in the wilderness with: his half-brother. What follows is a comedic, character-driven trek through the undergrowth where the hunt for the elusive cryptid takes a backseat to years of family baggage. Shander uses the mockumentary style to great effect. By leaning into the behind-the-scenes nature of the hunt, he allows for those awkward, improvised-feeling moments that really sell the humor. The film doesn’t try to be The Blair Witch Project. It’s more interested in the comedy of errors that happens when two guys who don’t like each other try to track a legend.

Tasty Bones (2026): We’re deep in the woods at a late-night campfire, the kind of setting that immediately signals you’re in trouble. Our protagonist has clearly had one too many and stumbles away from the safety of the firelight to relieve himself at the edge of the tree line. In a moment of drunken boredom, he starts whistling. It’s a mindless act, a way to fill the silence. Then, from the impenetrable black of the woods, a sound ripples back: a whistle, identical to his own, but with a cadence that is just… off. Director Ronald Short wastes no time turning this simple, unsettling interaction into a nightmare.

Packages (2026): Directed by Nick Barat, this short asks us to imagine a city where the service economy has reached its absolute, logical conclusion. Here, anything and everything you desire can be dropped at your doorstep in an instant. Isn’t that already happening? No matter. Our protagonist, a man just trying to navigate this delivery-obsessed urban sprawl, finds out the hard way that when you order anything, you’re bound to get something you didn’t ask for. Director and writer Nick Barat frames this as  Franz Kafka for the Amazon Prime generation, where the packages aren’t just material goods. They’re manifestations of the protagonist’s own fractured reality. Barat comes from a creative background spanning two decades as a DJ, producer, and the editorial mind behind The FADER magazine. 

Taco Night (2026): If you think you’ve seen every variation on existential dread, John Roche III is here to remind you that the most profound life crises often happen over the most mundane meals. The premise is deceptively simple. A man sits down for a taco night, and the sheer weight of his own existence decides to crash the party. As he stares into the abyss of his dinner, his mind begins to unravel, and he starts to ponder the great beyond. Maybe he should have gotten a burrito instead.

Midnight City (2026): Bill Watterson, the director of Dave Made a Maze, is back and he’s decided to pull us deep into the grimy, smoke-choked streets of Midnight City. If you’ve been craving a detective flick that feels like it got its pages mixed up with the Elder Gods, this is for you. Dutch Lazarus (Yuri Lowenthal, who wrote the script) isn’t your typical sleuth. He’s the guy you call when the case involves something that doesn’t quite fit into the local precinct’s ledger. He a specialist in the kind of cases that usually end with a body and a pile of unanswerable questions. But the status quo takes a nose-dive when Sadie (Tara Platt) walks into his office. She’s as cryptic as she is compelling. She doesn’t just hire him; she plays him, stymieing his usual investigative rhythm at every turn. I want an entire movie of this supernatural noir.

Open Mic (2025): A bomb set is said to be the worst thing that can happen to a stand-up comedian. But Jano Pita’s Open Mic takes that professional death sentence and pushes it into the red, turning a standard stage-fright nightmare into body horror. Our lead is a stand-up comedienne who has bet everything on a make-or-break set at a local open mic. The room is dead, the air is thick with indifference, and the audience is actively hostile. As the heckles start and her jokes don’t land, she hits a psychological breaking point. But instead of just walking off stage, her biology decides to take over. Her body begins a horrific, involuntary transformation, contorting and tearing itself apart in a way that turns her failed set into the most gruesome, visceral performance art the audience has ever seen. Fulci would love one of these punchlines.

My Left Hand is a Part of Me (2026): Directed by Natasha Halevi, this film invites viewers into a tense story where the heroine’s hand seems to develop a mind of its own. What starts as a minor spasm quickly escalates into a gripping struggle for control, creating a sense of suspense that keeps the audience on edge. As the limb asserts its own agency, the psychological spiral deepens, leaving viewers eager to see how it unfolds. Good thing she has a cutting board.

The Candle (2026): You know that old saying, “Have your cake and eat it too”? Director Ren Ariel Sano takes that to its violent, logical conclusion. When a seemingly innocent birthday celebration goes sideways, the titular candle becomes the catalyst for a night of absolute mayhem. Soon, the sweet treat decides to turn the tables and start consuming the guests. Can candles be cursed? This movie claims that it is decidedly so.

Wall Udder (2025): In a near-future suburbia, the ultimate status symbol is having a functional, living udder surgically installed onto your living room wall. It’s the ultimate conversation starter, a display of wealth that separates the elite from the commoners. But as the film progresses, the absurdity of the premise gives way to a darker, more obsessive question that the characters—and by extension, the audience—have to grapple with: is this just decor or an object of desire? The film spirals from a satire of lifestyle trends into a strange, intimate meditation on obsession, culminating in the ultimate, uncomfortable question: would you actually fuck it? Director Alexandra Hayden, thank you for putting this riddle into my head.

Pimple (2025): In Borbulha, directed by Fernando Alle, we follow a young boy with a pimple. It starts simple, but soon it all quickly spirals into a biological nightmare. When the inevitable happens and the pimple bursts, it doesn’t just release a bit of pus. It triggers a chain reaction of body horror that decimates the bullies who abused him. And from then on, the blood flows. Also: A pus monster with a gun. This speech at the end brings it all together: “They mocked you for your pimples, but don’t be sad. The excess of pimples in adolescents is due to high production of testosterone. They think they are better than you, but when you grow up, you will have virility and energy to please women in bed — or men, I don’t judge — while the ones who mock you today will become adults with thinning hair and limp dicks. So remember this: when you grow up, you will be happy.”

The Mrs. Wolf Show (2026): A friendly, overly wholesome housewife hosts her own daily program, complete with a beaming audience and a pristine set. Things go sideways the moment an unsuspecting salesman wanders onto the stage, thinking he’s there for a standard pitch. What follows is a brutal game of cat and mouse where the friendly hostess holds all the cards. As the cameras keep rolling, the show morphs from a harmless daytime broadcast into something far more sinister, forcing the salesman to realize that the most dangerous predators are often the ones wearing a cardigan and a permanent, frozen smile. Director Drew Highlands really does a great job of mixing modern horror and 50s variety and sitcom feel.

You can watch this either in-person or virtually at the Chattanooga Film Festival. For more info, visit the official site.