The 14 movies we're most looking forward to in 2026
Director Nicolas Winding Refn, center, and the cast of “The Neon Demon,” photographed in Los Angeles in 2016. (Christina House / For The Times) It is hard to believe that it’s been a full decade since Danish director Nicolas Winding Refn’s last feature film, 2016’s “The Neon Demon,” a disorienting treatise on fame and Los Angeles. Even having made two single-season streaming series in the interim, he has seemingly been missing in action, the absence of his visual flair, bent humor and taste for provocation leaving an empty space in theaters. So it is welcome news that he will be back at some point this year with “Her Private Hell.” Aside from a brief teaser promising “something groovy,” little is known regarding what the movie is about. Refn shot in Tokyo in 2025 with a cast that includes Charles Melton, Sophie Thatcher, Kristine Froseth and Havana Rose Liu with music by Italian composer Pino Donaggio (famous for his ’80s work with Brian De Palma). The film will be released by Neon, who have had a chokehold on Cannes in recent years, so that makes the festival a likely a place for Refn to unleash “Hell.” — M.O.
