HERETIC

(director/writer: Scott Beck, Bryan Woods; cinematographer: Chung-hoon Chung; editor: Justin Li; music: Chris Bacon; cast: Hugh Grant (Mr. Reed), Sophie Thatcher (Sister Barnes), Chloe East (Sister Paxton), Topher Grace (Elder Kennedy), Elle Young (Prophet); Runtime: 110; MPAA Rating: R; producers: Julia Glausi, Stacey Sher, Jeanette Volturno, Scott Beck, Bryan Woods; A24; 2024-USA/Canada)

“Its first half works beautifully as a psychological thriller.”

Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz

Regular collaborators Scott Beck and Bryan Woods (“65″/”Haunt”) are co-directors and writers of this dark horror pic, a cerebral chamber piece with an unsettling religious twist. Its first half works beautifully as a psychological thriller, only to somewhat disappoint in its second half with an inability to bring things to a boiling point.

The atheist, elderly Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant) is a self-taught religious scholar–a loner living in a fancy house in a remote area. During a rainstorm, two young Mormon missionaries, Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) and Sister Paxton (Chloe East), knock on his door and try to convert him after he previously told the Church elders he might be interested in converting. He invites them in, lying that his wife is home (their religious dogma forbids them to be alone in a house with an adult male stranger). He traps them in his house and delivers a hateful and threatening sermon on the hypocrisies of religion and their falsehoods.

In this tense, talky and psychological cat-and-mouse horror pic, the provocative sermonizing by the villainous Reed is weaponized and the hapless missionaries are in peril.

In the third act the story derails, as its fast start (which I loved) fizzles out and the beautiful acting by the three leads (especially by Grant) seems wasted. 

It played at the Toronto Film Festival.

REVIEWED ON 10/20/2024  GRADE: B
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