Extremely Thrilling

Rating: 9/10 (18 May 2020)

Creepy beyond belief, "Hereditary" is one of those movies you shouldn't describe in detail, because if you do, it will not only ruin surprises but make the listener wonder if you saw the film or dreamed it. The movie sustains a throb of dread throughout its first 90 minutes, and its final 30 are off-the-rails in the best way. Writer/director Ari Aster structures the tale so that it's hard to be sure if the uncanny events you're seeing are real or figments of thge imaginations of the Graham family, a clan cursed both by Biblical bad luck and a genetic disposition towards various types of mental illness.
Toni Colette stars as Annie Graham, an artist and mother who's coping with the death of her mother while trying to finish an exhibition of dioramas that appear to depict her own family's life and Annie's internal state. Alex Wolff is Annie's oldest child, Peter, a sad-eyed pothead drifting through life. Milly Shapiro plays Charlie, Peter's younger sister, a disturbed 13-year-old with the dead stare of a statue. Gabriel Bryne plays Annie's stoic, kindhearted husband Steve, who just wants the family to be happy and struggles to make peace. All are reeling from the death of the family matriarch, who we learn was anything but cuddly. The family is uncomfortable with frank displays of emotion, and with anything that might reveal their interiors to one another. Annie tells her husband that she's going off to the movies when she's really attending a grief management circle that meets in a church basement. Peter anesthetizes himself with marijuana.
If I give anything else away, it'll just be a huge spoiler for the audience to watch.
Overall it's a very thrilling, mind blowing and thoroughly researched film which is bound to keep you at the edge of your seats.
Not for the faint hearted.