{"id":768588,"date":"2026-06-29T21:56:15","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T21:56:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/768588\/"},"modified":"2026-06-29T21:56:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T21:56:15","slug":"forget-backrooms-a24s-low-budget-horror-hit-undertone-hits-1-after-a-weekend-on-hbo-max","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/768588\/","title":{"rendered":"Forget Backrooms, A24’s low-budget horror hit Undertone hits #1 after a weekend on HBO Max"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s been a strong year for horror<\/a>. While the genre has long been a reliable force at the box office, over the past six months, movies<\/a> like Obsession and Backrooms<\/a> have become a phenomenon, surprising the industry with high ticket sales and the glee they draw from a massive Gen Z audience. Now, another low-budget horror hit is causing an impact, this time on streaming, with it climbing to HBO Max’s number 1 spot over the weekend.<\/p>\n

A24’s Undertone premiered in theaters nationwide on March 13th, 2026. Directed by Ian Tuason, the Canadian movie grossed over $21.6 million in the US and Canada, a sum that vastly outperformed its $500,000 microbudget. It follows a couple of podcast hosts who come across a set of audio files detailing a couple’s possession, putting them in contact with a paranormal force. The story narrows its focus on one of the hosts (Nina Kiry), who returns home to care for her ailing mother.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would say it’s a creepypasta movie,\u201d Tuason told Polygon<\/a>. \u201cTheir podcast is a creepypasta podcast, and the 10 audio files that were emailed to them are creepypasta media. So yeah, this movie was built on top of creepypastas.\u201d<\/p>\n

Undertone was added to HBO Max on June 26, quickly becoming a streaming hit. The movie is ranked #1 on the platform, performing better than the Glen Powell-led How To Make a Killing, They Will Kill You, and Steven Spielberg<\/a>‘s Ready Player One, according to the tracking site FlixPatrol.<\/p>\n

What’s next for Ian Tuason?<\/p>\n

\"Evy
\n Image: A24<\/p>\n

The unexpected success of Undertone has made Tuason one of the rising stars of the horror genre. According to The Hollywood Reporter<\/a>, Tuason will be leading a Paranormal Activity reboot, marking the rebirth of the successful franchise that debuted in 2007 and released seven entries in the following years.<\/p>\n

The Paranormal Activity<\/a> movies are found-footage horror, following families and people terrorized by unexplainable entities from within their homes. The scares feel real and invasive, captured through security cameras, camcorders, and night vision lenses. It’s a franchise that shares some of the DNA of Tuason’s work.<\/p>\n

Jason Blum and James Wan are joining the project as producers, with the reboot scheduled for release on May 2027.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m a big fan of the series, so I’m excited for other fans to get hit with some big reveals,\u201d Tuason told Polygon<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Before Undertone, Tuason was known for his live-action VR horror shorts, which were highly viewed on YouTube and landed him a showcase at SXSW. The movie marked his feature directorial debut and has been labeled as part of a movement within the horror genre exploring the creepypastas<\/a> of the digital era, with the filmmakers influenced by the scary stories they stumbled upon on the internet when they were younger.<\/p>\n

\"Director
\n Image: A24<\/p>\n

\u201cI wasn’t consciously deciding to hop on any wave,\u201d said Tuason. \u201cI was influenced by film in general, just wanting to make the best film I could make. Didn’t matter which genre I was in \u2014 but I love horror. So I wasn’t really paying attention to what other people were making when I was making mine. But now that I am, I can see [the trend]. Maybe [horror directors] feel more free to do it because so many other people are experimenting with the genre.\u201d<\/p>\n

A new take on the Paranormal Activity world seems like the perfect next step for him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It’s been a strong year for horror. While the genre has long been a reliable force at the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":768589,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[64,63,134,344],"class_list":["post-768588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-entertainment","tag-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=768588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/768589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=768588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=768588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=768588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}