{"id":8176,"date":"2024-11-10T13:42:08","date_gmt":"2024-11-10T18:42:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=8176"},"modified":"2024-11-28T10:16:10","modified_gmt":"2024-11-28T15:16:10","slug":"heretic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/11\/10\/heretic\/","title":{"rendered":"Heretic"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Heretic<\/strong> (2024)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A24\/Horror\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 110 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (some bloody violence)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Scott Beck and Bryan Woods\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Scott Beck and Bryan Woods\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Chris Bacon\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Chung Chung-Hoon\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 8, 2024 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, Chloe East, Topher Grace, Elle Young.<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

If it\u2019s A24, it has to be elevated horror.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The above is one of the rules of modern horror. If it\u2019s released by indie studio A24 (Hereditary, Midsommar), chances are it\u2019s going to be one of those elevated deals with the phrase \u201cbut it\u2019s really about\u201d in most plot descriptions. I think we\u2019ll be seeing and hearing it a lot in regard to Heretic<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0On the surface, Heretic<\/strong> is about two young girls trapped in the home of a creepy stranger. In other hands, it would likely be a superficial horror film toned down just enough to be PG-13. In the hands of Scott Beck and Bryan Woods (Haunt), it\u2019s really about <\/em>the fallacies of organized religion. The antagonist, in order to teach his victims a harsh lesson, subjects them to an ordeal that will surely force them to question their belief system.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Sisters Barnes (Thatcher, The Boogeyman) and Paxton (East, The Fabelmans), missionaries with the Church of Latter-Day Saints, knock at the door of Mr. Reed (Grant, The Gentlemen). They\u2019re there to tell him about their religion. He invites them inside. They tell him they can\u2019t unless there\u2019s another woman present. He assures them his wife is inside baking a blueberry pie. They come in and try to tell him about their church. That\u2019s when things start to get weird.<\/p>\n

\u00a0There\u2019s something unsettling about Mr. Reed and it\u2019s not that he\u2019s something of an authority on the subject of religion, not entirely anyway. He gives off a bad vibe. The girls, upon discovering he\u2019s been lying about his wife, decide they should leave. The problem is he\u2019s locked the front door and refuses to open it. After delivering a lecture in which he claims to know the \u201cone true religion\u201d, he tells Barnes and Paxton they\u2019re free to leave through the back. He gives them a choice of which door, one marked \u201cBelief\u201d and the other \u201cDisbelief\u201d. Choose accordingly.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I suppose it goes without saying that the nightmare really begins when the girls go through the door of their choice. That\u2019s pretty much a given. What Mr. Reed puts them through is sick and freaky. Now let me qualify that statement. It\u2019s not a Saw-type situation involving elaborate booby traps and severe physical torture. Heretic<\/strong> is absolutely NOT torture porn. That\u2019s not to say the girls don\u2019t suffer. Reed goes to extreme lengths to make his point about religion. He makes them question everything they\u2019ve ever been taught about God and their faith. That\u2019s mental torture which can be as bad as or worse than the physical kind.<\/p>\n

\u00a0This is NOT the charming, awkward Hugh Grant we remember from classic rom-coms like Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill and Love Actually. It\u2019s a darker, sinister Grant whose smile reeks of malevolence. In Heretic<\/strong>, he\u2019s like a puppet master playing with the girls like they\u2019re pieces on a game board. He might allow them free will, but he\u2019s always in control. Grant doesn\u2019t overdo it in the role. Rather, he dials things back a notch or two making Reed a quiet but no less dangerous menace. I wouldn\u2019t say Reed is one of the greatest horror movie villains of all time, but he\u2019s chilling in a way some others aren\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u00a0One of the things I like best about Heretic<\/strong> is that it doesn\u2019t give us one-dimensional victims. Barnes and Paxton aren\u2019t merely lambs set up for the slaughter. They\u2019re actual characters with depth. Paxton is a lifelong Mormon with less street smarts than Barnes, a convert whose mother joined the church after a tragedy. She\u2019s also the more pragmatic of the pair. Whereas Paxton answers Reed\u2019s questions no matter how uncomfortable, Barnes is thinking of a way out. Both actresses do fine work, but East gains a slight edge by refusing to depict her na\u00efve character as a mere damsel-in-distress. Instead, she\u2019s a scared girl who must tap into her inner strength if she means to survive.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Heretic <\/strong>is essentially a three-person piece meaning you only need to concern yourselves with those three characters (Reed, Barnes and Paxton). There is one other character of note, the girls\u2019 overseer at the church (Grace, BlacKkKlansman). When they don\u2019t return from their mission work on time, he goes out looking for them. He shows up at Reed\u2019s house looking for them. Reed denies ever seeing them. That\u2019s more or less the extent of his involvement with the story. He\u2019s merely a devise to ratchet up the tension a little.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s hard to say how Heretic<\/strong> will go over with the masses. I think a lot of people are going to be put off by it. It\u2019s not a horror movie in the vein of Terrifier or Smile. It\u2019s smarter and more cerebral. There\u2019s a lot of talking, especially in the beginning. It takes a while for something to \u201chappen\u201d. To the film\u2019s credit, none of it is actually boring. Grant\u2019s character makes some interesting points about organized religion and how they\u2019re all basically variations of the same idea. In one scene, he points out the similarities between all the major religions. It held my<\/em> attention, but it won\u2019t hold everybody\u2019s. I saw a few audience members getting restless during these scenes. The guy sitting in front of me fell asleep a couple of times.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Heretic<\/strong> lapses into familiar territory as it gets closer to the end by leaning into some of the usual conventions of the genre. Where it all leads is freaky. That\u2019s fine and all, but what really sticks out for me is the ambiguous final scene. I\u2019m not going to give it away, but I do think its meaning will be cause for debate among exiting viewers.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s been a fairly strong year for horror and while I can\u2019t say Heretic<\/strong> is as good as The Substance and In a Violent Nature, it is quite good. It has a few decent \u201cBOO!\u201d scenes. The cinematography by Chung Chung-Hoon (Oldboy) is a real asset. He makes excellent use of the single setting, Mr. Reed\u2019s labyrinthine home. We get a palpable feeling of claustrophobia as the camera peers down dark hallways and staircases. The house itself feels threatening with its deceptive coziness. When you put it all together, it makes for a fairly effective horror movie, one with a brain.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Heretic (2024)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A24\/Horror\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 110 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (some bloody violence)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Scott Beck and Bryan Woods\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Scott Beck and Bryan Woods\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Chris Bacon\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Chung Chung-Hoon\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 8, 2024 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, Chloe East, Topher Grace, Elle Young. Rating: *** If it\u2019s A24, it has to be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8201,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-horror"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/Heretic-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8176","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8176"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8176\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8202,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8176\/revisions\/8202"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}