Written by Andreas Babiolakis

Many cinephiles have crowned 2024 the “year of horror”, with such a wide variety and amount of spooks and chills winding up on the big screen all throughout the year. That doesn’t mean that every single horror film this year is a successful one, and I’m not even going to beat about the bush today with Heretic: a psychological horror film that has something interesting to say but goes about it in a highly typical, dull way. It’s the kind of film where there really isn’t much to say, so let’s just hop right into it. We see two Mormon missionaries, Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) and Sister Paxton (Chloe East), going about their daily, door-to-door duties of trying to find new recruits. The film spends no time having them pop up on the door of our main antagonist, Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant, playing against type). There’s no build up or preparation before this moment, and this kind of no-nonsense storytelling seems bold at first. In actuality, Heretic fails at obtaining the depth it is seeking because it is so rushed. It hurries to make its point, just to sneer “See? I told you so!” in your face. What’s the use in making a point if you botch it?

The missionaries try to convert Mr. Reed, who appears to be a humble hermit who is waiting for his wife to finish baking a blueberry pie. He invites the Mormon duo into his home, and they view this as an opportunity to try and win Reed over and welcome him into their faith. What transpires is Heretic’s attempt at stirring the pot: a discussion about how all organized religions are forms of manipulation, and they all stem from the one “true” religion (which I won’t spoil, but it’s the kind of deduction you’ll make from maybe ten or twenty minutes into the film, and one you’ve likely made many years ago). Much of Heretic is your standard locked-in-a-nightmare flick, with heavy handed statements and sequences used to make points (again, points you’ve likely heard a trillion times before). There are two types of atheists: those who keep to themselves because they really don’t care about religion, and those who never shut the fuck up, as if to say that atheism is their religion; if you truly don’t believe in something, you wouldn’t worship the idea of not worshiping (as they say, “thou doth protest too much”). Heretic is the latter kind of atheist: a film I believe is secretly religious but has to convince others — and itself — that it isn’t (then again, the symbolism in the final shot indicates that this could be a spiritual film after all).

*Heretic* sets up for scares. It is, instead, a ho-hum affair.

Heretic’s points are the kind I heard way back in grade eight, when conspiracy videos were all the rage online; this whole accusation of all religions being a rip off of ancient traditions is not a new one, nor does Heretic take the discussion anywhere new (or the subject of societal corruption and manipulation). It relies on basic sentiments to just have Hugh Grant — who is quite intriguing in this role, I might add (and so the Grant renaissance continues) — commit bad acts and say mean things. Heretic wants to be a philosophical mainstay, but it is no better than a basic slasher film that aims to dive deeply into the psychology of its killer. Don’t read this review as me being hurt by a film questioning religion: I am not religious, so this doesn’t bother me. I’m a film fan first and foremost, and I want films to be good and to be able to make their points strong, coherent, and effective. The concept of discussing religion and society’s psychological and spiritual impacts (the positive and the negative) has been covered before. Even this year, a film like Conclave has more to say about the particular concept of religion being used inappropriately and does a better job of making these points. Heretic feels rather lazy: like it knows that both the lack of any higher power and methods of torture can be scary enough for many viewers, and it relies on these ideas alone. It wants to say something more, but by the time the credits began to roll, I thought “Who cares?” and walked out without thinking about Heretic for another second. That’s precisely what I’m about to do now as well.

Andreas Babiolakis has a Masters degree in Film and Photography Preservation and Collections Management from Toronto Metropolitan University, as well as a Bachelors degree in Cinema Studies from York University. His favourite times of year are the Criterion Collection flash sales and the annual Toronto International Film Festival.