Neon is still popping champagne after the huge box office weekend that their latest release, Longlegs, experienced, which led to the biggest opening of their seven-year history. The indie studio is proving themselves as the place to be for burgeoning talent and provocative releases, and they’re looking to establish that point more with each new project they acquire. Fresh off the success of Longlegs, Neon has made moves to pick up a horror film from YouTube personality and filmmaker, Chris Stuckmann.

Per Deadline, Neon has acquired the worldwide rights to Stuckmann’s documentary/found-footage horror film, Shelby Oaks, a project he both wrote and directed. The deal came together through Neon’s Vice President of Acquisitions & Production Jason Wald, while CEO Aaron B. Koontz, of Paper Street Pictures, handled the deal on Stuckmann’s end. Shelby Oaks is set to have its world premiere at the Fantasia Festival this Saturday.

Stuckmann began his career as one of the most prolific film critics on YouTube. He now has 2.04 million subscribers on the platform with over 760 million views across his videos. The YouTube creator launched a Kickstarter campaign in 2022 to fund his first film, Shelby Oaks, which raised $1.39 million in less than a month, making it the most funded horror movie ever on the platform. The project gained even more attention when horror maestro Mike Flanagan became an executive producer, giving the film even more credibility.

Shelby Oaks is described as a supernatural horror film that uses elements of documentary and found-footage style to tell its story. The film follows Mia (Camille Sullivan) who is desperately searching for her sister Riley (Sarah Durn) following her mysterious disappearance. Her vanishing was caught on the last tape featuring a group of paranormal investigators known as the Paranormal Paranoids. This leads Mia on a search that may find her realizing that the imaginary demon Riley once spoke of during her childhood may not be so imaginary after all. The movie also stars Brendan Sexton III, Michael Beach, Robin Bartlett, Keith David, Charlie Talbert and Emily Bennett.

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Neon has been on a considerable role lately. In 2024 alone, they broke their own opening weekend record in a matter of months. Back in March, the Sydney Sweeney-led horror film Immaculate, posted the biggest opening weekend of the company’s existence when it debuted to $5.3 million. That film has since grossed over $27 million globally on a $9 million budget. That opening weekend record was shattered just this very weekend when their film Longlegs opened to $22.6 million. Produced for less than $10 million, Longlegs also posted the biggest opening weekend for an original horror film this year.