Top 10 Movies of October 2026: Box Office Earnings, Cast, Story & Trailers
October 2026 was a great month for movie lovers. Horror fans got Other Mommy and Clayface, thriller fans got Verity and Whalefall, and gamers saw Street Fighter come to the big screen. Anne Hathaway and Dakota Johnson’s Verity took the top spot, and a surprising A24 documentary finished right behind it.
In this post, we count down the top 10 movies of October 2026, ranked by their October box office earnings (data from Box Office Mojo). Only movies that were released in October are included. For each movie you get the story, cast, director, release date, earnings and trailer.
Let’s start the countdown from number 10.
10. Wicker
On the edge of a seaside village lives a Fisherwoman (Olivia Colman) who is lonely and mocked by everyone around her. She asks the local basket weaver (Peter Dinklage) to weave her a husband made out of wicker. The strange marriage brings her happiness, but it also brings outrage, jealousy and chaos to the conservative village.
Release date: October 23, 2026 (limited), wider release on October 30
Directors: Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson
Cast: Olivia Colman, Alexander Skarsgård, Peter Dinklage, Elizabeth Debicki, Marli Siu, Nabhaan Rizwan, Richard E. Grant
Distributor: Black Bear
October gross: $11.89 million
Total gross: $20.33 million (2,374 theaters)
Why watch it: It is one of the most unusual films of the year. It premiered at Sundance 2026, runs about 105 minutes, and is based on the short story The Wicker Husband by Ursula Wills.
9. Whalefall
Diver Jay Gardiner (Austin Abrams) is searching for his late father’s remains in the ocean when a giant sperm whale swallows him whole. Trapped inside the whale with only about an hour of oxygen left, Jay has to remember the lessons his father Mitt (Josh Brolin) taught him if he wants to escape alive.
Release date: October 16, 2026
Director: Brian Duffield
Cast: Austin Abrams, Josh Brolin, Elisabeth Shue, John Ortiz, Jane Levy, Emily Rudd
Distributor: 20th Century Studios
October gross: $16.06 million
Total gross: $17.47 million (3,065 theaters)
Why watch it: It is a survival thriller with a very original idea, based on Daniel Kraus’ 2023 novel. It is rated PG-13 and runs about 106 minutes.
8. Sense and Sensibility
This is a new version of Jane Austen’s classic novel. After their father dies, the Dashwood sisters are left with very little money and have to leave their home. Elinor (Daisy Edgar-Jones) is sensible and keeps her feelings to herself, while her younger sister Marianne (Esmé Creed-Miles) follows her heart. Both sisters face love, heartbreak and difficult choices about money and status.
Release date: October 16, 2026 in the US (September 25 in the UK)
Director: Georgia Oakley (screenplay by Diana Reid)
Cast: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Esmé Creed-Miles, Caitríona Balfe, George MacKay, Frank Dillane, Fiona Shaw, Herbert Nordrum, Bodhi Rae Breathnac
Distributor: Focus Features
October gross: $16.33 million
Total gross: $18.39 million (2,571 theaters)
Why watch it: It is a warm, emotional period romance about sisterhood, runs about 132 minutes, and has received generally positive reviews.
7. Digger
Tom Cruise plays Digger Rockwell, an ultra-rich oil tycoon who is trying to stop an environmental disaster. The film is a dark, over-the-top satire about greed, money and the way powerful people ignore the climate crisis. It is described as “a comedy of catastrophic proportions”.
Release date: October 2, 2026
Director: Alejandro G. Iñárritu
Cast: Tom Cruise, Riz Ahmed, John Goodman, Sandra Hüller, Jesse Plemons, Michael Stuhlbarg, Emma D’Arcy, Sophie Wilde
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
October gross: $18.07 million
Total gross: $18.22 million (3,321 theaters)
Why watch it: It is a very different role for Tom Cruise, and Iñárritu’s first English-language film since The Revenant. It is rated R and critics are divided, so it is a movie people love or hate.
6. Wildwood
Prue McKeel is a brave young girl whose baby brother is taken into the Impassable Wilderness, a hidden magical forest near Portland. Prue and her classmate Curtis follow him into a world of talking animals, strange creatures and a war that is about to begin. To save her brother and protect the forest’s fragile future, she must risk everything.
Release date: October 23, 2026
Director: Travis Knight
Voice cast: Peyton Elizabeth Lee, Jacob Tremblay, Carey Mulligan, Mahershala Ali, Angela Bassett, Awkwafina, Jake Johnson,
Maya Erskine, Jemaine Clement, Richard E. Grant
Distributor: Fathom Entertainment (a LAIKA film)
October gross: $23.58 million
Total gross: $40.75 million (3,005 theaters)
Why watch it: It is LAIKA’s biggest stop-motion film so far, made by the studio behind Coraline and Kubo and the Two Strings. It is based on the books by Colin Meloy and Carson Ellis, rated PG-13, and runs about 132 minutes.
5. Clayface
Matt Hagen (Tom Rhys Harries) is a rising actor whose face is badly disfigured by a local gangster. Desperate to fix it, he volunteers for an experimental treatment by a scientist (Naomi Ackie). The treatment works, but it turns him into a shape-shifting monster made of living clay.
Release date: October 23, 2026
Director: James Watkins (written by Mike Flanagan and Hossein Amini)
Cast: Tom Rhys Harries, Naomi Ackie, Max Minghella, Eddie Marsan, David Dencik, Nancy Carroll
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures (DC Studios)
October gross: $41.27 million
Total gross: $57.28 million (3,478 theaters)
Why watch it: It is a Batman villain story told as a body-horror film, and it is rated R. It is the third film in the new DC Universe and a good pick for Halloween season.
4. Street Fighter
Based on Capcom’s famous fighting game, the film is set in 1993. Chun-Li (Callina Liang) brings together old friends Ryu (Andrew Koji) and Ken (Noah Centineo) for the World Warrior Tournament. As they fight their way through the tournament, they uncover a hidden conspiracy and are forced to face each other.
Release date: October 16, 2026
Director: Kitao Sakurai
Cast: Noah Centineo, Andrew Koji, Callina Liang, Roman Reigns, Jason Momoa, 50 Cent, David Dastmalchian, Cody Rhodes,
Andrew Schulz, Vidyut Jammwal
Distributor: Paramount Pictures (with Legendary)
October gross: $52.09 million
Total gross: $57.55 million (3,575 theaters)
Why watch it: It is the third live-action Street Fighter movie and has a huge cast of actors, wrestlers and fighters. It is full of action and was made for IMAX screens.
3. Other Mommy
A young girl named Bela starts talking about a visitor she calls “Other Mommy”. At first the name sounds harmless, but the supernatural entity soon begins to demand more and more access to the family. Her mother, played by Jessica Chastain, has to fight to protect her daughter.
Release date: October 9, 2026
Director: Rob Savage
Cast: Jessica Chastain, Jay Duplass, Arabella Olivia Clark, Dichen Lachman, Arian Moayed, Karen Allen
Distributor: Universal PicturesOctober gross: $55.01 million
Total gross: $58.45 million (3,370 theaters)
Why watch it: It is a scary supernatural horror film based on Josh Malerman’s novel Incidents Around the House. It is produced by James Wan’s Atomic Monster and Blumhouse, so it is perfect for horror fans in October.
2. You Can See Everything
This is a documentary about Elizabeth Holmes, the disgraced founder of Theranos. About a month before she was due to go to prison, Holmes and her partner Billy Evans invited a film crew into their home to show who she really is. They chose comedian Nathan Fielder to film their daily life. Fielder asks direct questions and the film slowly becomes much stranger than anyone expected.
Release date: October 16, 2026
Directors: Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim
Featuring: Elizabeth Holmes, Billy Evans, Nathan Fielder
Distributor: A24
October gross: $60.43 million
Total gross: $79.38 million (3,243 theaters)
Why watch it: The AP gave it four out of four stars. It runs about 174 minutes (almost three hours) and is rated R. The film is hard to describe, and the makers want to keep one big secret hidden, so try to avoid spoilers.
1. Verity
Lowen Ashleigh (Dakota Johnson) is a struggling writer who is hired to finish the remaining books of bestselling author Verity Crawford (Anne Hathaway). Verity is badly hurt after a car accident and cannot work. Lowen moves into the Crawford house, where she meets Verity’s husband Jeremy (Josh Hartnett). While going through Verity’s notes, she finds disturbing secrets, and attraction, obsession and danger begin to blur together.
Release date: October 2, 2026
Director: Michael Showalter (screenplay by Nick Antosca)
Cast: Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson, Josh Hartnett, Ismael Cruz Córdova, Brady Wagner
Distributor: Amazon MGM Studios
October gross: $73.82 million
Total gross: $75.77 million (3,572 theaters)
Why watch it: It is based on Colleen Hoover’s bestselling novel, so it already had a big fan base. It is a psychological thriller of about 117 minutes, rated R, and it was the biggest new release of October.
Final Thoughts
October 2026 had something for everyone: scary horror, emotional drama, a classic romance, family fantasy and a game adaptation full of action. Verity clearly won the month, while You Can See Everything and Other Mommy proved that bold and original stories can find a big audience. If you missed any of these in theaters, keep them on your watchlist for when they arrive on streaming.
Which October movie was your favorite? Tell us in the comments, and check back for our next box office rankings. Note: Box office numbers are estimates from Box Office Mojo and may change as the tracking updates.
