Film Review: HERETIC (2024): A Masterpiece of Terror with a Very Creepy Hugh Grant and a Brilliant Performance by Chloe East
Heretic Review
Heretic (2024) Film Review, a movie written and directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods and starring Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, Chloe East, Topher Grace, Elle Young, Julie Lynn Mortensen, Haylie Hansen, Elle McKinnon, Anesha Bailey, Stephanie Lavigne, Wendy Gorling, Carolyn Adair and River Codack.
Filmmakers Scott Beck and Bryan Woods have crafted one of the most terrifying horror masterpieces of all-time with the absolutely brilliant, Heretic. The big news is, of course, Hugh Grant’s amazing precision at playing the definitive creep in this film. However, the movie one ups Grant’s work with the performance by The Fabelmans star, Chloe East, who all but steals the movie out from under Grant by the film’s bone-chilling concluding scenes. I called East out for her Oscar-worthy work in The Fabelmans but she didn’t get love from the Academy for that role. Given that Heretic is a horror movie, it’s unlikely East will get an Oscar nod for this picture but she’s certainly deserving. East (and the filmmakers) gives her role a twist viewers won’t see coming and I wouldn’t dare spoil the fun for horror fans who will love discovering East beside the phenomenal Hugh Grant who plays a dangerous and bizarre weirdo to absolute perfection.
Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East play two religious girls, Sister Barnes and Sister Paxton, out to convert others who have an interest in the Church of Latter-day Saints. They talk about condoms at the start of the movie which makes it clear these girls are not just thinking about their Sunday school lessons. However, they earnestly believe in a higher power it seems and are ready to instill their knowledge onto others. They make the mistake of riding their bikes to the home of Mr. Reed (Grant) who says he’s making a blueberry pie for them when they come into the home. Our girls only enter the house because Reed says his wife is there which makes them feel safe being that another woman is present. There may be another woman (or several women) in the house, but his wife is probably not one of them.
Reed starts to discuss iterations of board games that prove Monopoly was stolen from another game and was not an original entity. Then, Reed goes on to link that point with religion and shows the girls the errors of their ways of thinking. If the ideas these girls are preaching about are real like the girls suggest they are then why are they based upon other principles which date back way further than the religion they’re trying to “sell.”
Soon, Reed gives the girls a choice between two doors labeled, “belief” and “disbelief.” Sister Paxton starts to see that Reed is serious when he says that religion is a hoax and she goes towards the disbelief door, but Sister Barnes suggests choosing the other door for reasons she soon discusses. Sister Paxton seems weak and frail and immature at the start of the movie, but she turns out to have a lot of intelligence which manifests itself in the way she plays into Reed’s mind games.
Grant is electrifying in his best movie performance ever. He started out in show biz as a romantic leading man in movies like Nine Months but this character he plays here in Heretic is more likely to be a client to a $50 hooker (like one Grant hooked up with when he was younger) than the charming guy who wooed Andie MacDowell in Four Weddings and a Funeral. Grant is slimy and effective as a man exploiting two innocent victims, but Sister Paxton will soon prove to be his opponent in a creatively exciting way which the filmmakers have expertly laid out to the audience. This is, quite simply, one of the best horror films ever made.
Each moment in Heretic is carefully crafted by its two directors. The house the film sets itself in has traps, sneaky side doors and enough surprise rooms to give the house in Barbarian a run for its money. I loved following our lead women through the maze Reed lays out for the girls who may not be the first ones who have entered the home.
Sophie Thatcher’s role is less showy than Chloe East’s. Thatcher plays Sister Barnes as the smart one while East plays Sister Paxton as the naive one at first. Thatcher and East have a great on-screen rapport that gets more complicated when they’re forced to use their wits to survive against all odds. Thatcher excels in the role she was hired for and her work in this film is of the highest caliber.
However, this is Chloe East’s film from beginning to end which you will discover as you watch the picture. East creates Sister Paxton with subtext and sophistication underneath her apparent naiveté. You’ll root for her as she starts to piece together the purpose of Reed’s twisted games. East is a master of the acting game, and her work here is not to be taken lightly. I don’t understand why she wasn’t more honored for The Fabelmans but, this time out, she pretty much carries an entire movie on her shoulders and it’s a fabulous piece of acting yet again for which she will hopefully be recognized with some kind of accolades.
This film would be a lot less fun without Grant, though, who plays one of the creepiest guys you’ll ever meet. Viewers will root for our heroes and wish for Grant’s character to get his just desserts. Heretic has a lot going on. It examines morality, mortality, life, death, and the choices we make that help dictate the lives we choose to live and the beliefs we decide to instill within ourselves.
Heretic ends with the image of a butterfly landing and then disappearing. Sister Paxton describes how she would come back to someone she loved if she died during the course of the movie and the butterfly plays into that part of the film. This film chooses its conclusion carefully and exquisitely. It’s the best of the best when it comes to horror movies and never sells its audience short. It believes its audience is intelligent and doesn’t insult the viewer. Instead, it will make the viewer seek their own answers in life but not before wishing to see our heroines get the hell out of the house Grant’s Reed occupies. I won’t tell you who, if anyone, makes it out alive. However, you probably will figure it out as you watch this fascinating and frightening new horror classic that is a gift to the world of horror and to cinema. Chloe East. Remember that name. Hugh Grant will get people into the theater, but East plays the character who makes it worthwhile by the time the end credits roll.
Rating: 10/10
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