In a Strange House, a Test of Faith

Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, and Chloe East 
in "Heretic"
Photo Credit: Imdb.com

Many classic horror films have dealt with religion in one way or another.  Whether it’s classics like “The Exorcist,” “Rosemary’s Baby,” and “The Omen,” or modern examples like “The First Omen,” “Immaculate,” or “The Vigil,” the genre has tackled this subject in fascinating ways that have shown how the characters view their faith and how their beliefs play into the wider scope of the different horror narratives.  These movies have had an impact because of how much religion plays into the everyday lives of countless people.

Writers-directors Scott Beck and Bryan Woods have now made their stamp on religion-themed scares with their psychological-horror thriller, “Heretic.”  Boasting a devilish lead performance, a thought-provoking story, and an enticing setup, Beck and Woods bring us a horror film that delivers on emotion, smarts, and chills.

Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) and Sister Paxton (Chloe East) are Mormon missionaries trying to look for new converts.  On one of their outings, they visit the house of Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant), an enigmatic, yet seemingly kind individual.  However, Barnes and Paxton soon realize he has trapped them in a dangerous game, one that will test just how strong their beliefs really are.

While we saw Grant go against his good-guy type and play a humorous villain in “Paddington 2,” he maintains some of his usual bumbling wit near the beginning of this film, only to go somewhere deeper on the spectrum of villainy this time around.  Here, he portrays an individual who has an unsettlingly affable and very calculated way of presenting himself as he tries to keep Sisters Barnes and Paxton ensnared in his trap.  You can see him absorbing the situation as the Sisters enter his house and he plans what comes next, and Grant’s disquieting performance always keeps you on edge as you watch him make the steady shift from his familiar Hugh Grant-persona to something more on the malevolent side.  All of this makes for one of the year’s finest performances as Grant’s sense of menace grows stronger and his character brings the Sisters deeper into his game.  For someone who almost always portrays nice-guy characters, Grant looks like he’s relishing this opportunity to slowly shed the charming persona we’ve come to know through decades of him being in romantic comedies.  Grant will certainly make a believer out of you with what he can do when portraying a villainous character, and I can’t wait to see in which genre he does this next.

Thatcher and East have terrific chemistry as they show a believable naïveté as they walk into what seems like a benign situation.  When they become more and more aware of what’s happening, Thatcher and East are engaging to watch as they try to take in their surroundings and be on their guard for what Mr. Reed might have planned for them.  They provide great work in exhibiting how they try to understand this danger that breaks their sheltered view of the world, and Thatcher and East show a thrilling increase in prowess and resilience as they try to beat Mr. Reed at his own game.

The screenplay by Beck and Woods creates a slow-burn story that’s all the more nerve-racking because you wait to see what kind of move Mr. Reed will spring next.  While this movie is a great horror story, it’s also an intriguing and in-depth view of the characters, with each section of the movie revealing things about them that drive the next section of the film.  There’s a good deal of the runtime that’s dedicated to the immersive dialogue, but the tension never falters because of how well the narrative constructs a scenario that has the characters question their beliefs.  Aside from this, the narrative boasts a clever setup of different parts of the house acting as figurative states of living, being in purgatory, and being dead, and it offers fascinating viewing to see how the faith of the characters plays into each section.

Beck and Woods created unbearably tense situations as writers on the first “Quiet Place” movie, and as directors, they translate that screenplay talent when taking the directorial reins of “Heretic.”  With just a limited cast and location, they’re able to maintain the apprehension throughout as we’re placed in close quarters with the characters, having us experience the layers of the discussions that the characters have, while also giving us an unease of being trapped with a stranger.  For this sense of closeness and claustrophobia, Beck and Woods get help from cinematography by Chung Chung-hoon.  In terms of lensing the interiors of an odd house, his talents come through, calling to mind how memorably he photographed the Neibolt house set-piece in “It: Chapter One.”  Here, he captures the details by framing the sections of the house in such a way that encourages us to move our eyes across the screen to take in every detail and figure out what it means in the overall scheme of Mr. Reed’s treacherous game.  He employs a slow and smooth camera that eases us into the situation and maintains such movements to keep that simmer going as you remain on the lookout for clever visual clues.

2024 has had its share of superb original horror films, like “The Substance,” “Oddity,” “Longlegs,” and “Late Night with the Devil.”  Now, “Heretic” can easily join their company.  With this film, Beck and Woods show that they can be a great filmmaking pair when contributing to the intelligent horror that we pray for.

Grade: A

Across a Vast Distance, an Unbreakable Sibling Bond

From left: Grace Pudel (Sarah Snook), Percy 
Pudel (Dominique Pinon), and Gilbert Pudel
(Kodi Smit-McPhee) in "Memoir of a Snail"
Photo Credit: RottenTomatoes.com

When it comes to animated films, it seems like most of those that come from American studios these days are films from established properties.  Although some of those movies can be great, such as last year’s “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” and “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem,” there’s something about seeing an original animated film because of how that format of storytelling can allow a filmmaker’s imagination to run wild in the story and characters that they create.  A lot of times these days, if you want to see something truly original in terms of animated films, it’s best to look overseas and see what kinds of narratives those filmmakers have to offer. 

One of the latest international animated films to be released hails from Australia with writer-director Adam Elliot’s stop-motion tragicomedy, “Memoir of a Snail.”  With wonderful voice performances, a beautiful and poignant story, and visuals that bring Elliot’s ideas to full effect, this is an animated world in which you can lose yourself.

In 1970s Melbourne, Grace Pudel (Sarah Snook) and Gilbert Pudel (Kodi Smit-McPhee) are twins who are inseparable.  However, following the deaths of their parents, they’re sent to different foster families at opposite ends of the continent.  As the years go on and the hardships never seem to end, they’ll try to get by with the hope that they’ll see each other again.

Snook and McPhee have superb chemistry as siblings whose love for each other transcends the vast distances that are placed on them.  You can feel the everlasting bond in their voices as they miss each other more and more over the years.  There’s a sadness to both of them when they continue to lose time that they could’ve spent together, but there’s also a resilience within them as they face many challenges that threaten to crush their spirits, which gives them the strength they need to make their reunion possible.  There’s so much emotion and warmth that Snook and McPhee put into their performances, and the power that they give to their work in this film won’t leave you anything less than absorbed in their journey that shows how strong the connection between siblings can be.

While the film has several good supporting performances, the standout is Jacki Weaver as Pinky, a neighbor of Grace’s who befriends her.  Weaver exhibits a lot of wisdom in the voice that she gives her character, displaying someone who has been around the world and has seen it all.  Pinky is a joyful character throughout the film who’s always there to give Grace the help that she needs to make her day-to-day life more bearable.  Weaver instills Pinky with a personality that’s humorous and loving, giving the viewer a sense of reprieve from the difficulties that Grace encounters.

The screenplay by Elliot provides a dark, fanciful Roald Dahl-esque story that invests you in the characters and the unfortunate situation in which they find themselves.  It’s a narrative that’s imaginative, witty, heartbreaking, and uplifting, bringing audiences into a bittersweet fairy-tale that captures what it means to be a sibling.  As Elliot goes through the story, he tackles themes concerning the cages that are thrust upon us from outside forces vs. the ones that we set up ourselves, while also focusing on what it means to be hurt by the things that tend to give us comfort.  Through these themes, we get to learn the emotional depths of Grace and Gilbert, with Elliot instilling small, clever details throughout the film that emphasize the different aspects that go into their personalities.  Elliot creates engaging story threads for each of the two main characters, ensuring that both will keep you immersed in the poignant drama as the narrative brings you back and forth between the siblings.  While most of the film obviously unfolds after the death of Grace and Gilbert’s parents, Elliot offers plenty of insight into what their life was like beforehand, a life that was tough, but had a lot of love.  By showing this, we’re able to have a greater sense of the loss that they face once they become separated.

As a director, Elliot constructs beautifully strange visuals that transport you to the lives of the characters both before and after the inciting event.  While maintaining a tone that deftly mixes wit and heartache, Elliot highlights that blend of sensibilities to bring us imagery that dances between whimsical and dour, and the wonderful score from Elena Kats-Chernin helps emphasize the sense of wonder that’ll you experience during the movie.  There’s a richness in Elliot's animation that offers so much for us to look at and get a better understanding of his distinct vision of Australia.  The pain-staking detail that Elliot brings to the images matches what he brings to the film in terms of the screenplay, showing a filmmaker who does what he can to make sure the viewer is immersed in this journey from beginning to end.

Within a deep story about the power of the familial connections that sustain us, “Memoir of a Snail” captures what it means to be closed in, only then to finally break free.

Grade: A

A Love Story Between Two Classes

Mark Eydelshteyn and Mikey Madison in "Anora"
Photo Credit: Imdb.com

We’ve all seen stories like those, stories about two people who fall in love from different worlds, despite the restrictions that their social and economic stations have on them.  Given how long this type of narrative has existed, there’s a template that such stories follow, and we know where they’ll end up before the credits roll.  Despite the familiarity that we’ve come to expect, there are some cases where we’re not taken along the route that we expect, and this can make the story all the more impactful because of how much it tries to be more truthful to life.

Writer-director Sean Baker accomplishes this for his romantic comedy-drama, “Anora.”  It’s a love story unlike any that you’ve seen in a long time, one that washes over you with its zeal, laughs, emotion, and electric lead performance.

Anora (Mikey Madison) is an exotic dancer at an upscale Manhattan strip club.  When she meets the son of a Russian oligarch, Ivan (Mark Eydelshteyn), the two begin a relationship and get married soon after.  When Ivan’s parents threaten to travel from Russia to get the marriage annulled, Anora and Ivan face increasing complications that put their love in jeopardy.

Madison jolts the screen to life with her star-making performance that shows both her character’s strength and vulnerability.  There’s so much vigor to her character as she makes it through the rough patches of her day-to-day life, showing someone who seems to roll with the punches and try to keep her tough exterior intact.  Madison’s commitment to her character does excellent work in absorbing you in Anora’s life, offering a chance to get to know her as she steps into a life of luxury and then has to hold onto it and make that happiness last as long as possible.  Madison provides Anora with the type of streetwise grit where she’s not afraid to take control of a situation and stand up to those who get in her way.  This is a performance that comes with humor, joy, sadness, tension, and so much else, and Madison does whatever she can to make sure that you’ll remember her, whether it be in the heart-to-heart talks between her and Ivan or the chaotic highs into which she ventures later in the story.

The film comes with several performances from actors who may be unfamiliar to American audiences, but they leave an impact nonetheless in how much they inhabit their characters.  Eydelshteyn is terrific as a throws-his-money-around individual who never seems to grow up; Karren Karagulian is a lot of fun to watch as Toros, Ivan’s handler who tries to do his best to maintain the film’s increasingly messy situation; and Vache Tovmasyan and Yura Borisov as Garnick and Igor, respectively, Toros’ two henchmen, the latter of whom delivers one of the film’s most surprising performances in terms of where his arc goes.

All five of these performances coalesce incredibly well throughout the movie as everything unravels and they go further into disorder.  The way in which the cast members bounce off of each other to bring as much vivacity as possible to every scene is what makes this one of the finest casts of the year.  This is especially true in the movie’s tense, nearly-half-hour home-invasion scene where everyone gives whatever they can to the craziness of the sequence, all of which sets the unpredictable tone for the second hour of the film.

The screenplay from Baker takes a simple template and creates something invigorating, making a story that’s both a complex romance and a fast-paced thriller.  While most of the first half of the movie is a wonderful look at the main character and what could be her first real shot at love, it soon goes into a wild ride that takes you around New York City as Anora’s relationship meets one hurdle after another.  In the middle of the narrative’s kinetic location-hoping, we have a view of Anora and how other people see her, offering a depth to her character as she tries to have people see that she’s more than what they assume.   

With this movie’s NYC settings, as well as a segment that takes place in Las Vegas, Baker makes sure to capture their sights with cinematography by Drew Daniels.  Throughout the film, Daniels uses handheld camerawork to have us feel the energy that the characters experience, while also utilizing immersive long takes that allow for dialogues and emotions to unfold, a method that’s the most impactful in the movie’s final scene, which helps it become one of the best endings of the year.  Between Daniels’ photography and Baker’s screenplay and direction, the movie has the haywire energy of NYC-based movies, like Josh and Bennie Safdie’s “Uncut Gems” and “Good Time," with characters talking over each, being on the move for most of the time, and being followed by a dynamic camera that manages to keep up with the action.

It’s always exciting to see a filmmaker upend a certain type of story that has made its foundations through countless movies, and with what Baker does to the girl-meets-boy structure in “Anora,” you’re in for something that breaks those rules and creates a bold and exciting whirlwind of a romance.

Grade: A

In the Vatican, an Election with Several Possible Outcomes

Ralph Fiennes in "Conclave"
Photo Credit: RottenTomatoes.com

In 2022, director Edward Berger delivered a harrowing war epic with his remake of “All Quiet on the Western Front.”  Using a sprawling scale of the battlefields and trenches to bring us the horrors of war, Berger visualized a story of the tensions and bloodshed of which men are capable under the most dire of circumstances.  It was an emotional and ambitious movie that had me looking forward to what Berger would bring us next.

With his latest film, Berger deals with tensions amongst men on a smaller scale, yet one that impacts the world, nonetheless, in his mystery-thriller, “Conclave,” which boasts a quiet, yet galvanizing lead performance, tense direction, and a story that’ll have you leaning forward at each twist and turn.

When the pope passes away, the Vatican is in a race to install a new leader for the Catholic Church.  Cardinal Thomas Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes) is put in charge to lead the conclave to choose the next pope.  As the election unfolds, he deals with candidates who want the position more than anything, as well as the secrets that some of them are hiding.

Fiennes delivers one of the best performances of his career as a man tasked with finding a leader.  He brings out his character’s sense of duty, but also shows the burden of having such an assignment.  Fiennes displays the gravity of what this task entails, presenting his character’s views of what such a decision means for both the church and the world.  This is a performance that thrives on how subdued it is, with Fiennes bringing forth a man of faith who’s also bothered by some questions that he has for the church that he serves.  His work in this film is superb throughout, but one of his most memorable scenes is one at the beginning of the voting process where he gives opening remarks about faith and uncertainty.  It’s a speech that captures his character’s viewpoints, all of which have complexities added to them when he doesn’t want the papacy himself, despite thinking that those best fit for power are those who don’t seek it.  It’s a fascinating depth that this role carries, and Fiennes is absolutely magnetic with how he grips your attention as you anticipate the decisions that Cardinal Lawrence will make.

Backing up Fiennes are some superb supporting performances from Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow, Sergio Castellitto, Lucien Msamati, and Carlos Diehz as cardinals who are in the running to be the next pope, and Isabella Rossellini as a Sister and the cardinal’s head housekeeper.  All of these cast members add their own bit of intrigue in the way that they approach their characters, having you wonder who’s hiding what secrets and what it’ll mean for the conclave as it commences.

The screenplay by Peter Straughan, which is based on the 2016 novel by Robert Harris, offers a tantalizing mystery that gets you hooked from the first scene.  From there, like all great film puzzles, it doles out details little by little as we become more wrapped up in the goings-on behind the Vatican’s walls.  The narrative is populated with characters who have their own goals for who they want to be in the church and what they want the church to be, and it’s never anything less than intriguing to see these clashes of views as the pool for the papacy successors becomes shallower.  All of this leads up to one of the most surprising conclusions I’ve seen in a movie recently.  “Conclave” is one of those occasions where I’m glad I didn’t read the book first because the last 10 minutes had the people at my screening murmuring in surprise with what it reveals, offering an electrifying experience of communal discovery that feels rare these days with theatrical releases.

Just as Berger did with the vast settings of “Western Front,” he’s able to bring us the fullest details of the more enclosed settings of the Vatican, giving off a strong sense of intrigue as we try to guess what’s going on within.  To accomplish this, he collaborates with cinematographer Stéphane Fontaine, who works on a level that he did with his work on Pablo Larraín’s 2016 film, “Jackie.”  Similar to how Fontaine gave us a look into the inner layers of the White House for that historical drama, he does the same with the Vatican in “Conclave.”  Fontaine not only has a talent for photographing places where people in high positions of power operate, but also when these places are in a period of transition.  With the pairing of Berger and Fontaine, they pull back the curtain on areas that many don’t get to see in real life, taking us through the courtyards, hallways, and private rooms of the Vatican.  Whether we’re in a scene with a character alone in a room finding out a secret, or a scene with many characters where there’s voting taking place, Berger maintains the thrills of the story no matter where he takes us on the Vatican grounds.  Helping to highlight these thrills is composer Volker Bertelmann, who worked with Berger on “Western Front,” and here, he provides music that emphasizes stringed instruments to maximum effect to have us feel the tightly-wound tension and weight of what’s happening around the characters.

“Conclave” is the type of fast-paced thriller that offers an equal abundance of suspense and narrative depth that cements this as one of the best films of the year.  While Cardinal Lawrence holds uncertainty as a virtue, you’re certain to be enthralled with this captivating mystery.

Grade: A