Insufferable theology nut Mr. Reed (an extremely game Hugh Grant) holds two Mormon missionaries’ hostage, Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) and Sister Paxton (Chloe East), in his house and tasks them to choose between belief and disbelief in Scott Beck and Bryan Woods creepy cat-and-mouse horror, Heretic. Grant’s campy and menacing performance and the great rapport between Thatcher and East are gripping even when the wordy philosophical sermons on control and religion become tiresome.
Directors/writers Beck and Woods set up an intriguing mystery with Mr. Reed’s puzzling behaviour. He’s essentially another old white man hellbent on playing God and his conversations and interactions with the two women are written to be uncomfortably tense. From the very start the writers pleasingly give the women agency when it comes to their opinions on sex, misogyny and dogma. They give the old-know-it-all a run for his money and their fiery debates and comebacks are nicely performed. It chimes with fraught political times when it comes to the autonomy of women and their bodies, especially when it comes to current US law regressions.
Heretic works for the most part, but there’s a lack of dread when it comes to the more graphic horror elements, and by the final reveal it feels like you’ve been watching an Inside No.9 episode that’s gone on a little too long. In addition to that, the film’s conclusion is eye-rolling and not as clever as it thinks it is. Still, there’s plenty of surprise, gore and humour along the way. Meta references to iterations in popular culture also keep things entertaining despite serving as a reminder that we may have seen the themes this horror movie explores play out many times before.
Playing out in one place for the majority of the running time, the set, soundtrack choices and contraptions to keep the narrative going are intricately designed, but the screenplay doesn’t entirely have a hold on its ideas. It sits somewhere between a Saw film, Deathtrap and Edgar Allen Poe but the atmosphere is just not as potently handled.
Heretic will be released in cinemas on 1 November.
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