ZINZZU 1:1 – October 2024 – Link

Films need to trust their viewers. Commercial films, especially, need to control expectations and comprehension to create a cohesive product. While watching Heretic, I could feel the anxiety to make people understand. Heretic is an upcoming horror film from A24 about two young Mormon missionaries who must escape a skeptic’s house of illusions. The film premiered at TIFF, a first for writer-directors Scott Beck and Bryan Woods (previously A Quiet Place, Haunt, and 65). They appeared at the Princess of Wales Theatre with the three leads: Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, and Chloe East. The concept of the film is existentially ambitious: it’s an attempt at connecting religious devotion to the modern era of pop culture-celebrity supremacy. The script sometimes reads like an r/atheist post, far up its own ass about its ingenuity, but the earnest interest in faith, the girls as the heroes, saves it from being annoying ideologically.

When subtle and humorous, the film succeeds greatly. The amusement of watching heartthrob Hugh Grant in a creepy role never wanes (which isn’t so weird after Cloud Atlas or even The Gentlemen), but it uses that classic conceit (Suspicion, anyone?) in a smart way. As in, Grant’s star persona not only eases the audience into a false sense of security, it’s the point of the film. Stars like Grant are worshiped like saints and idols, gossip and posters and dedicated following. Grant’s position in the film’s themes are subtextual, the character any other person diegetically. Part of making the character a dangerous, eerie figure (including the threat of predation) is that Grant plays the character like a romantic lead. He provides the only levity when things get rough, so he is the source of solace even when the blanket of security is ripped away. But you get a sense in his rom-coms (even in Glass Onion) that he’s along for the ride, equal or less-knowing than his partner. Here, he holds all the cards. Here, he isn’t an object of desire to young women. The film is the process of contending new information about ____ with existing fixations. Textually, it’s about faith. Subtextually, it’s about celebritydom. That is the subtly I enjoyed.

Much of this success comes from casting director Carmen Cuba and Grant. Part of it is also the push-pull from the fantastic Thatcher and East and the direction of tone by Beck & Woods. But as screenwriters, I was let down by their constant impulse to explain everything. I got the film’s ideas, motives, twists before they objectively verbalized and showed every step of the way. I felt like I was watching the Sparknotes summary at some points. As a viewer, figuring out a film is far more fulfilling and exciting than having an interpretation crystalized in the text. Why buy the puzzle and not the poster?

World Premiere at TIFF – Out now on VOD