Hereditary

I saw A Quiet Place earlier in the year, and to me that was the best horror movie since It Follows a few years back. Hereditary is also a horror movie, but you can’t really compare it to A Quiet Place. A Quiet Place is a brisk 90 minutes that gets started right from the get-go without bothering with any clunky exposition because it knows it already has a solid premise that doesn’t need dialogue explaining the backstory. Hereditary, however, is a slow burner. It is atmospheric and disturbing and is always setting itself up. There are surprises and scares along the way, but it certainly fills up its 2 hour runtime engaging the core characters. Both of these movies mentioned are worth seeing in theaters (shame on you if you didn’t see A Quiet Place), but this review is obviously only for 1 of these movies.

    To start reviewing Hereditary more, I actually want to make one more comparison, and you probably won’t be able to guess it either. I’m talking about How To Train Your Dragon 2. I will give a moment to process why on earth I might use this film as a comparison… Okay, moment over. If you saw this animated sequel-- and you really should, it’s a fantastic film honestly-- you probably enjoyed the visuals and the story and the likable characters. But that’s not why I’m talking about it. What makes How To Train Your Dragon 2 stand out from other animated films are the scenes in between the action. There would be scenes with just two characters talking with each other, and the writing was just spot on. It was really well done and pulled the entire film together cohesively. Hereditary is similar in how it builds its arcs with all of the family members.

    If you watched the trailer, there isn’t too much to know about the film except a creepy looking little girl in the family with dead grandma waving to the camera. Dead grandma is in fact how the film starts out, and I’m not spoiling anything by saying that her soul isn’t quite done with whatever mission it had to do. We get to know the mother Annie played absolutely brilliantly by Toni Collette who seems a bit disconnected and is trying to figure out the right way to grieve her mother’s passing. The father Steve is introduced in that amicable way where he’s happy if the family is happy and brings about a sort of mellow warmness to the film. The eldest is a pot-smoking high school student named Peter (pretty sure one of the bongs he uses was penis shaped, but I have not and will probably not try confirming that). The daughter Charlie has this creepy look where you’re not sure if there is any sort of deformity or mental issue, but other than her slightly off look and her peanut allergy, she’s a little girl. Who also makes this creepy clicking noise. And cuts off the head of a dead bird. But just a little girl.

    Without explaining any of the mystery away, the rest of the plot is pretty simple. The family tries moving on all in their own ways, but there’s obviously something supernatural lurking in the background. The mother goes to one of those meetings like AA except it’s for grieving parents, and despite her hesitation, it seems like that is helping her. Also, side note, Annie makes miniature lifelike scenes-- all of which she draws from her life. There isn’t much story relevance to this, but the first time filmmaker Ari Aster (one of the catchiest names ever) uses it to a really cool trippy effect in transition shots. One of her sets is of their large house surrounded by trees, and in some transition shots, it is difficult to tell if you’re looking at real life or one of the mom’s scenes.

    The acting-- especially from Toni Collette-- is top-notch, the story-- while simple-- is executed better than almost any, and the scares are genuine. For one more comparison that I think will help, I saw The Shining written all over this film from art direction, pacing, and overall mood. The horror here is just genuine. You will not get your dozens of jump scares like from The Woman in Black for instance, but you get truly unsettling scenes, disturbing moments and images, and a constant sense of dread settling in. The whole movie is engaging, but I do not want to lie in saying that the movie does take its time in getting to the climax. It’s the kind of movie that rewards the audience for paying attention the whole time, and just for the climax alone, it is worth seeing this movie in theaters. Luckily for me, I saw this with my oldest brother who dashed out 10 minutes into the film because the lights weren’t turned off, and he got them to turn them off because this film totally needs it. Although I’m a huge fan in the execution of the climax, the ending itself won’t please everybody-- possibly myself included. It was not what I was expecting, it’s also a bit confusing, and it’s just one of those endings that needs time to process. I’m not 100% behind it, but I still respect it. This will not be a film for everybody by any means. It is not mainstream horror. But it is the well executed type of film that keeps me coming back to horror. I’m picky about my horror films, and Hereditary easily cracks my top 5 for the genre. If you want high quality horror and a hard time sleeping that night, go see Hereditary this week before it leaves theaters.

In Brief:

• Incredibles 2 is arguably better than the original. A somewhat predictable villain, but a strong motive and good execution makes it work. And overall, it really is great fun the whole family can enjoy. And give me a Frozone spinoff.
• I will probably do a review for a different animated film coming up. Also possibly one for an 80s gangster crime film. My internship ends in a couple of weeks, so that might open me up to doing more reviews this summer
• Never really watched the show, but I found it interesting to learn about Mr. Rogers in Won’t you be my Neighbor? It’s probably more interesting than the show itself
• Sicario: Day of the Soldado is a gritty, bloody thriller. It doesn’t have the visceral punch that Denis Villeneuve and Johan Johansson brought to the first, but the plot from Taylor Sheridan (wrote the first, Hell or High Water, and wrote and directed Wind River) is actually an improvement. It sets up a possible third movie, and bringing Emily Blunt back I think would be a good move.
• The action in Skyscraper looks too much like a Fast and Furious film, so I have little hope for that film.

• July 27th. Mission Impossible: Fallout. It’s going to be great.