Why Critics At Sundance Are Leaving 'Hereditary' Utterly Terrified
As the 2018 Sundance Film Festival creeps into its second half, mostly overshadowed by awards season buzz, one film has broken through the news cycle and sparked its own hype: Ari Aster's "Hereditary." It's Aster's feature debut as a writer/director and yet it has already nabbed the tentative top spot amongst the year's horror films. Between this and the Oscar nominations for Jordan Peele's "Get Out," maybe there's something in the air for first-timers who intend to frighten us? Here's what the early reviews are saying about "Hereditary":
Here's A Brief Plot Sketch (The Less You Know, The Better)
Like any scary movie, you'll probably get the most enjoyment out of Hereditary if you go in blind. But to give you at least a vague sense of what it's about — minor spoilers ahead — the film centers on the Graham family, who are heading to their estranged grandmother's funeral when the story begins. While Annie (Toni Collette), Steve (Gabriel Byrne) and their teenage son, Peter (Alex Wolff), are remarkably unaffected by the loss, the late matriarch still has a sinister grip on daughter Charlie (Milly Shapiro, bound to go down as a child horror-movie icon).
Just when it seems like "Hereditary" is entering traditional creepy-kid territory with Charlie giving off serious "The Omen" vibes, the movie takes an abrupt, violent twist that further the complicates the family's dark moment.
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Before It Indulges In More Conventional Scares, It'll Test Your Resolve With An Early Salvo
In the same way 2017's controversial mother! divided audiences with its combination of dark humor and visceral horror, Hereditary seeks to confound by swinging between moments of controlled Kubrick-ian terror and unhinged emotional hysteria. There were walkouts. There were people complaining when they marched through the snow to the bus.
The story unfolds at a deliberate creep, slowly unraveling its insidious design. But the shocks come early and often, beginning with something so upsetting, in its harrowing real-life possibility, that it may challenge viewers' capacity to keep watching. (I certainly felt a strong urge to bolt or at least look away from the screen—a sign that a horror movie is working like gangbusters.)
It's Definitely One To Watch In A Sold-Out Theater
This is just a great horror film, offering a great experience for packed audiences while also giving them plenty to discuss on the way home. The film goes to interesting places and arrives at a conclusion that is as impressive as it is horrific.
A single, unexpected sound effect sent my entire audience out of their seats, but it wasn't just the crack timing; the previous scene, a mere dialogue exchange, had already put us all on edge, priming our nerves for the scare.
Toni Collette's Performance Is Raking In Praise
Annie is a complicated character, sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes outright repulsive. The role only works because of Collette's power to sell her emotions to an audience that may want to distance itself from her visible agony. Watching her suffer is emotionally exhausting because she plays the character with such intensity.
Horror films don't usually merit award consideration, but Collette's performance here is next level, and I worry her efforts will go unnoticed. We think of great acting as something that is supposed to look effortless. This performance constantly looks difficult, excruciating even. It's a role that requires carefully modulated mania and emotion throughout, and Collette holds the entire film on her shoulders.
She crumbles beneath the grief, rages against those responsible, and finds a real ferocity on her way to the film's ending, and you believe every moment.
It's Amazing That This Is Aster's First Feature Length Film
Aster directs the film with a scrupulous focus on intensity. Over and over, he returns to close-ups of his characters' faces as they take in some grotesque offscreen horror that strains the limits of their sanity. He never makes these shots short and efficient: they're drawn out like studies in the facial mechanics of fear.
Using minimal resources to his advantage, Aster transforms the setting into a claustrophobic maze of long hallways, creaky attics, and strange figures creeping in the background.
It's difficult to believe Heredity could be anyone's debut film. Not only does it look great and feature respected actors like Toni Collette and Gabriel Byrne, but its scares are so well done, so effective and assured, you'd expect a veteran in charge. But nope, it's just some young whippersnapper scaring the hell out of you for two hours.
The film's distributors, A24, have yet to release a trailer or issue a premiere date for "Hereditary" — with all this Sundance buzz behind it, you can bet they'll do a big roll out for it soon.
