Hereditary – 5 out of 5
The current trend for horror stories seem to be ones engrossed in human drama. Look at anything made overseas like The Babadook, or John Krasinkski’s A Quiet Place or Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House. Each of these features are very creepy and unnerving but also involves a lot of human emotion and drama at their core. Personally, I like this approach because there is something to be said about a horror film that can make you weep one moment and then threaten to make your spine shiver its way out of your skin the next. Hereditary is just the latest one of these dramatic horror films and the feature is nearly perfect.
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| Ah yes, that is absolutely terrifying. |
Annie (Toni Collette) is a working artist living with her husband Steve (Gabriel Byrne), her son Peter (Alex Wolff) and daughter Charlie (Milly Shapiro). However, after her mother passes on, strange events start to occur around her and the family. After she is approached by a woman named Joan (Ann Dowd), she is offered a chance to finally be a peace with her troubled past and loss-filled present but instead finds frightening secrets that threaten to pull her and her family into darkness.
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| I hope for her sake that Shapiro doesn't get shoe-horned into horror films but I also won't deny that she was absolutely fantastic in this one! |
It’s hard to find a jumping off point when talking about Hereditary because it is doing literally everything right. For starters, the story is fan-freaking-tastic. My synopsis doesn’t do it justice at all. Aside from the fact that I did everything I could to avoid Spoilers, it’s hard to properly sum up the plot of this film because there’s so much depth to it. To top it all off, there’s a mystery around it all that you aren’t ever fully aware is even there. Due to this, when the ending arrives and all the pieces that had been laid out before you come together, it was impossible for me not to go “Ohhhhhh.” Of course, that moment of realization comes in-between the shivers going up my spine because this movie is freaky as hell.
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| She didn't see anything scary, she just stepped on a LEGO. |
Hereditary is a slow-burn horror film that never relies on jump scares and uses its music to create tension, ambiance and unease but never to spook. Slow-burn features can be a double-edged sword because they move slowly but often lead to very satisfying and extremely terrifying payoffs. Sometimes, unfortunately, they move slowly towards nothing and can get repetitive. So, with that being said, there was a real chance that this one could have been boring and disappointing. While I won’t make the claim that the plot was always moving at a decent pace (there are some moments that drag), the payoff that comes from this slow approach is incredible and wholly horrifying. The film also does a tremendous job of using music that never telegraphs upcoming scares but rather is crafting a foreboding front that is always looming and threatening to approach. Even when it feels like nothing is happening, the score gives the feeling that there is always darkness ready to strike around every corner. This is especially notable in the first act as the story is establishing itself. It made for the more mundane moments feel treacherous and unsettling and it really helped set the tone for the rest of the film.
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| The visuals are so good too that just looking at this still and you swear you can hear an amazing score. |
Writer/director Ari Aster also does a tremendous job at blending the horror of the film with its inherent emotion and family drama. I was amazed at how the film could, at one moment, make me cry over the struggles the family was enduring and then, the next minute, feel like my chest was about to burst as the my heart raced and the shivers went up my spine. This is only amplified by the amazing performances from the entire cast. Every player is doing a tremendous job at showcasing authentic levels of grief and coping mechanisms. The writing and performances combined so well to make me, as a viewer, sympathize with the characters and that only made the drama hit harder and the horror more effective.
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| This movie made great use of the background...and that made me have great use of my bowels. I'm saying this was so scary I shit my pants. |
If I was forced to come up with a drawback to Hereditary it would be the running length does feel long at points. I hate to say that the narrative dragged at times because it never truly felt that way but there are low points. Thankfully, these moments are few and far between and when they arrive they really do no harm beyond reminding you that this horror film is on the longer side. For all intents and purposes, Hereditary is as perfect as a horror/drama can get and is a prime example of how effective slow-burn features in this genre can work.
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