A24 has unveiled the first trailer for undertone, the buzzy festival hit horror from director Ian Tuason (recently tapped to helm the upcoming Paranormal Activity reboot) hitting theaters on March 13 – and we're not gonna lie, this one looks pretty damn terrifying.
Starring Nina Kiri (The Handmaid's Tale), Kris Holden-Ried (The Umbrella Academy), Michèle Duquet (The Virgin Suicides), Keana Lyn Bastidas (The Hardy Boys), and Jeff Yung (The Shrouds), in undertone, Evy, the host of a popular paranormal podcast becomes haunted by terrifying recordings mysteriously sent her way.
Following its premiere at last year's Fantasia, undertone has been scaring critics across the festival scene, including an upcoming showing at Sundance. After a competitve bidding war, A24 prevailed in bringing what is sure to be another horror hit to the masses.
What makes undertone uniquely creepy is that, according to Rue Morgue, Evy is one of the only characters to be shown on-screen in the film, with most other characters heard only as off-screen voices, leading to an isolating experience that conveys its horror mostly through skin-crawling sound design, some of which can be heard in today's first trailer.
In an interview with Eye for Film, Tuason further expanded on his influence and inspirations for creating undertone:
It started when I was writing a scripted narrative podcast, so that's what understone was initially. It was two podcasters doing their regular weekly podcast episodes, talking about creepypastas. And then my parents got sick, and I was a caregiver to both of them.
You know, all my life, I've been wondering why The Exorcist was so scary. That's the scariest movie that I've ever seen, and it traumatised me as a kid. I'm Catholic, so it really messed me up. I knew that one factor was the Catholic guilt and the fear of going to hell, but then another factor was that it was a movie where it took a child that's supposed to be something safe and make that the danger.
Tuason's inspirations make undertone part of a timely new horror trend based on creepypastas and Internet legends; other upcoming examples include the Crispin Glover-starring adaptation of The Third Parent, and A24's The Backrooms, the buzzy adaptation of Kane Parsons' viral found-footage series based on a creepy 4chan thread.
Check out the new trailer for undertone below, and for more, here's all the other horror movies we're excited for in 2026.
