Overlook Film Festival Unveals Full 10th Anniversary Lineup With New Side Shows Section, Boulet Brothers Return

The Overlook Film Festival has unveiled its largest lineup to date for its 10th anniversary in New Orleans.

The Overlook Film Festival is going bigger for its 10th anniversary.

The New Orleans horror celebration announced its full 2026 lineup on Wednesday, revealing a significantly expanded program that now includes 62 films, 10 live events and six immersive experiences. Running April 9-12 at the Prytania Theatres in New Orleans, this year’s edition marks the largest lineup in the festival’s history, according to the official announcement.

Among the biggest additions is a new section called Side Shows, a first for the festival that broadens Overlook’s genre reach without losing its identity. The section will spotlight films that may fall outside traditional horror but still carry the tension, violence and off-kilter energy that fit the festival’s world. That lineup includes Lionsgate’s “The Furious,” Magnolia’s “Normal” from Ben Wheatley and IFC’s “Over Your Dead Body,” Jorma Taccone’s remake of Tommy Wirkola’s “The Trip,” starring Jason Segel and Samara Weaving.

Overlook co-founder and Director of Film Programming Michael Lerman said the new sidebar reflects the festival’s continued growth while preserving its horror-first mission. The festival, he said in the announcement, wanted to make room for films that operate just outside the genre but still deliver the same level of thrills, gore and artistry audiences expect from Overlook.

The latest wave of additions also deepens what was already one of the spring’s most stacked genre lineups. Newly announced feature titles include “Affection,” “American Dollhouse,” “Buddy,” “Buffet Infinity,” “Capturing Bigfoot,” “CRAMPS! A Period Piece,” “Flush,” “Grind,” “Mārama,” “The Restoration at Grayson Manor” and “Suffocation.” The films stretch across horror, thriller, black comedy and experimental storytelling, with several carrying the kind of oddball premise that has become synonymous with Overlook programming.

A standout among the retrospective programming is a rare 4K screening of “Demon Lover Diary,” the Joel DeMott documentary often viewed as a precursor to later films about artistic ambition unraveling in real time. The screening will feature an appearance by Jeff Kreines, the film’s central subject.

Outside the feature lineup, the festival is leaning hard into the event side of its identity. The Boulet Brothers are returning to launch “The Boulet Brothers’ Dragula: Titans Tour,” which will double as one of the festival’s marquee live events. Overlook will also close with “Théâtre des Vampires,” a party timed to the 50th anniversary of Anne Rice’s “Interview With the Vampire,” which was first published on April 12, 1976.

That anniversary celebration feels especially fitting in New Orleans, where Rice’s influence still hangs over the city’s gothic image. Overlook co-founder and Executive Director Landon Zakheim said in the announcement that the alignment of the festival, the city and the anniversary felt destined, calling New Orleans the ideal home for the event’s mix of horror, spectacle and strange energy.

The immersive section is expanding as well. New additions include “Claws,” an interactive phone-call thriller for one audience member, “The Pumpkin Pie Show Presents: One-On-Ones,” and “Rebozo,” a limited audio performance told across six phone calls over two days. Those join a wider immersive slate that has become one of Overlook’s defining features.

Previously announced films still anchor the lineup, including opening night selection “Obsession,” centerpiece film “Leviticus” and closing night title “Hokum.” Other titles already on the board include “Faces of Death,” “Exit 8,” “Saccharine,” “Ugly Cry,” “Never After Dark” and Larry Fessenden’s “Trauma or, Monsters All.”

With the full schedule now live and passes on sale, Overlook’s 2026 edition looks less like a niche genre event and more like a full-scale horror takeover built around screenings, live performance, immersive storytelling and festival community. For a program that has always thrived on the space between arthouse horror, midnight madness and experimental oddity, its biggest year yet looks determined to push even further.

The full schedule and festival information are available through The Overlook Film Festival.