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| Images courtesy of A24 |
Scott Beck and Bryan Woods have been carving out their niche
in contemporary horror cinema ever since their 2015 indie found-footage
thriller Nightlight came into play.
Catapulting to superstardom by conceiving and producing John Krasinki’s A
Quiet Place before embarking on their own again with the 2019 slasher flick
Haunt. Then COVID-19 happened and
in the aftermath years later, the filmmaking team paired up with Sam Raimi on
the ill-fated Adam Driver sci-fi venture 65 which flopped at the box
office. Thankfully however, things seem
to be turning back around for them following the success of their adaptation of
Stephen King’s The Boogeyman and with their new A24 film Heretic,
a psychological religious horror thriller starring Hugh Grant as the
antagonist, they’ve made a swing that’s perhaps not as wide-reaching as their A
Quiet Place franchise but will no doubt catapult them further into the
indie horror stratosphere.
Opening in modern day Scotland, two Mormon missionaries of
the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Sister Barnes (Sophie
Thatcher) and Sister Paxton (Chloe East) traverse across rainy rocky rural terrain
to fulfill a special request of a hermetic middle-aged Scottish man named Mr.
Reed (Hugh Grant) to further explain their cause. At first they refuse entry into his home after
being invited in, but after insisting they try her delicious blueberry pie she’s
in the middle of baking they reluctantly agree and begin their theological
discourse. However, the mysterious man
immediately flips the table when he begins schooling them on the many
variations of religion and begins conducting a social experiment of sorts on
them which will determine their belief system and whether or not they’ll make
it out of there alive.
Flirting with hints of the supernatural, the dialogue heavy
chamber piece and a cat-and-mouse intellectual game, Heretic though a
bit fumbling with the closing act depending on your interpretation rests solely
on the screen presence and charisma of Hugh Grant in his first official horror
film since Ken Russell’s The Lair of the White Worm. For those who only know him in British
romantic comedies, you’re in for a rude awakening including but not limited to
a scene where he cuts open a woman’s arm and sticks his finger in the wound
fishing around for a surgical implant.
Exceedingly simple in setup, the whole film is a buildup on fear of the
unknown and playing along with social niceties.
A big aspect of the horror here involves how its two heroines and how
their once controlled and confident dialogue becomes stunted as they find
themselves cornered into choosing their words carefully. Aspects of the film including the use of
miniatures will no doubt remind viewership of a certain Ari Aster A24 horror
epic as well as the dark tunneling of the Silent Hill series.
Visually speaking, the film is a gothic horror wonderment
thanks to Oldboy cinematographer Chung Chung-hoon in 2.35:1 widescreen panorama
which at once evokes the Scottish landscape while also going in on the
trademark extreme close-ups of eyes and faces his work for Park Chan-wook has
become infamous for. The score by Chris
Bacon is serviceable and moody though at times I thought it tried too hard to
inform the viewer how to react to the strange proceedings occurring in Mr. Reed’s
house decked out with an alarm and lock system that will absolutely remind
viewers of The Silence of the Lambs’ Buffalo Bill. While the film has an underutilized Topher
Grace in the background as the faint glimmer of hope of escape as Elder
Kennedy, Hugh Grant is all but completely on fire in this to a degree you think
he’s on the cusp of bursting into song.
You can sense in his performance a kind of impish glee playing against
type after years of romcoms.
As fate would have it, Sophie Thatcher from The Boogeyman
and MaXXXine was herself a former member of the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints who has since moved on from the religion but brings
with it a lived-through authenticity other young actresses probably wouldn’t
have understood so fluently. Chloe East
plays against type along with Hugh Grant in a way by starting out as the
ineffectual damsel-in-distress easily put off by discussions of pornography as
seen in the opening credits montage (which are framed like the credits in Poor
Things) but soon starts to emerge as a resourceful survivor. All three actors have a lot of
tongue-twisting dialogue to wrestle with as they break down and dispense with
dogma after dogma before being cornered into a survival-horror scenario. The trio works so well together, you feel a
bit let down the film’s closure somewhat undermines their efforts.
At the press screening for the film, blueberry pie
scratch-and-sniff cards were handed out and following the film patrons were
given blueberry pie slices with a poster sticker for the film affixed to the
box, making the theatrical experience all the more interactive. In a way the film is like the mirror
soliloquy Edward Norton makes in 25th Hour, hitting every ethnic
group in a quick succession of firebrand ranting and raving, attacking every
and all dogma equally so no one feels singled out. Whatever your ultimate takeaway from the
religious infused A24 horror flick is, and it likely will be mixed, there’s no
denying Hugh Grant is a joy to watch in this role having what feels like the
time of his life excoriating his clean-cut goodie two-shoes image. Given how cantankerous Grant has been
offscreen in recent months including the press junket for Wonka, you
kinda get the sense with Heretic he is just sinking his teeth into this
movie with canine relish.
--Andrew Kotwicki
