Heretic

Two young religious women are drawn into a game of cat-and-mouse in the house of a strange man.

This is another A24 film and I have to say I’m really impressed with the consistency of what they’ve been doing. This film looks good and is acted well. I really enjoy the world building they do and how economical the story is that they’re telling.

Hugh Grant is fantastic in this film and he does lots of little things throughout his performance that really elevate the story. Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East are very good in this movie as well with Chloe giving a standout performance in her own right. Grant’s performance really does steal the show here and it makes sense that other people online would be gushing about it.

The whole house is a cage and they willingly entered it as soon as they stepped foot inside. The metal in the walls creates a faraday cage which is why they get no cellphone service. Before they see a cage they’re already in one. Wonder if that has something to do with the themes of the movie.

I do wish something came of the locking mechanism for the front door. It was an interesting idea and didn’t really go anywhere. I don’t understand why they didn’t challenge him on the door locking until tomorrow but they were still trying to just go along.

I’m curious if there is any extra meaning behind the pie being blueberry but I don’t think there is. I suspect it’s just for the resulting visuals from when it is eaten later.

If the poster over the fireplace wasn’t enough of a clue there are some references to Dante’s Inferno in this movie. There has been some attempt online to connect various stages of this movie and parts of the house to the 9 circles of hell but I’m not sure if it’s meant to be that literal.

There is a recurring mention of butterflies which I’m not sure exactly what they mean either. I don’t think anything is meant by the window being six sided where the butterfly is trapped. I suspect it just needed to be a small enough window where they could not fit through it. The butterfly at the end and the dream of a butterfly is a nice thing to repeat but honestly I think it just connects different parts of the story where no other connection really exists.

I only know about The Lesson (which is depicted in another poster in the same room) from what I’ve seen on Wikipedia but the image they use has the tag line of “Who is teaching whom?” which seems like they’ve drawn some inspiration for this film.

It’s such a damning touch to have the elder show up and ring the door twice just to make sure he has a pamphlet. If you needed any indication that the recruitment is more important than the humanity of the sisters I think you’ve got it.

The miracle being called a magic trick made me think of Arrested Development, “It’s an illusion, tricks are what…” But that also made me think of The Illusionist which does this exact sort of thing. Spoilers for The Illusionist (2006) too I guess. I do think it’s interesting that the sister who doesn’t believe in prayer also notices the body is in a different position. This seems like a deliberate choice to highlight that she sees things and rationalizes them even if she remains faithful.

I’m sure there is some commentary on the mysoginy of religion with all of Mr. Reeds victims seemingly being women. The only person not to be negatively impacted by him is the elder that visits looking for them.

Okay, I want to briefly touch on the apologetics of this film. I’ve seen a few reviews and posts about this film talking about how the religious arguments presented in the film are interesting. Maybe this just comes from being in these types of spaces in the past but none of this was new for me and I don’t think they’re very compelling. I’m not sure if the writers of the film deliberately made Mr. Reed have all these books but with a casual rediter’s understanding of the material.

I suspect this was not a deliberate choice in the same way that having him saying that “With great power comes great responsibility” comes from Voltaire (which isn’t true). More over there are similar lines in THE BIBLE. The movie spends a lot of time discussing things that could have been pulled directly from some online thread.

I don’t know that I buy the iteration message around the game Monopoly. The first game was made to illustrate the evils of capitalism and that message is then corrupted by putting you in the shoes of the capitalist and making having a monopoly the goal. This is not an iteration atleast not in the same way he’s discussing the religions in the same scene.

This certainly seems like a movie that wants to be way smarter than it is and is not particluarly scary or creepy. Clearly many people have enjoyed it more than me, so I may be an outlier.