Hereditary
This article is a part of Context’s podcast series Ending Explained. The audio version can be found on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
Ellen Taper Leigh, 78, Passed away after a prolonged illness at her daughter Annies house on April 3rd, 2018. Beloved wife of the late Martin Leigh (Rest in peace). Devoted mother of Annie Leigh Grahm and the late Charles Leigh (rest in peace). Cherished grandmother of Peter Graham and Charlie Graham. She is also survived by her son-in-law, Dr. Steven Graham. She will be missed.
Hereditary is the first feature film from writer/director Ari Aster. Ari had garnered the attention of production and distribution company A24 with his short form horror films. Most notably, The strange thing about the Johnson’s, Asters thesis film for the AFI conservatory. The Strange thing about the Johnsons examines a typical suburban family hiding a terrible secret. The film flips the narrative so closely associated with abuser relationships and went viral, leaking online after its debut at the Slamdance film festival. Asters talent as a filmmaker, delving into taboo subject matter is on full display here and the film is worth a watch to see the genesis of Aster as a filmmaker. His feature film debut, hereditary, would ditch some of the more taboo subject matter, but still deal with familial trauma in a way few filmmakers have the guts to. The film at times can feel a bit campy, almost like a 2011 version episode of Tale from the Crypt, but it was the type of short film that fit perfectly into the brand A24 was building for themselves. Partnered with Palmstar media, A24 optioned Ari Asters script for hereditary, giving the young filmmaker full control in making what he described as a family tragedy.
The film opens with a still of Ellen Taper Leighs eulogy, before framing a treehouse through a closed window as the camera pans inside to reveal an office full of miniatures. The camera then stops and zooms into a half completed miniature and seamlessly transitions to the real world bedroom of Peter Graham, grandson of the deceased. His father walks in and delivers Peter his suit for the funeral while asking where her sister slept that night. His sister, Charlie slept outside in the treehouse that framed the opening. The father, Steven Graham, seems to be taking a forward role in caring for the family. The mother, Annie Leigh, played by Toni Collete, waits in the car for the rest of the family before heading to her mothers funeral.
The opening of Hereditary, the framing device of zooming the camera into a miniature structure of the families home before allowing their lives to play out, is reminiscent of the opening of David Lynch’s film Blue Velvet. Lynch opens his film with serene static shots of flowers, mayberry-esque homes and families, before a man is injured in a gardening accident and the camera digs deep into the earth. Traversing through grass and bugs cannibalizing themselves while the viewer is left to wonder the meaning of this odd opening. I myself view it as David Lynch giving us a glimpse into the horror that lies just beneath the surface of every perfect looking façade. No matter how serene or beautiful a setting looks, there is also terror right below the surface. Hereditary employs a similar technique, only this time with the use of miniatures. The meaning I draw is one of a small piece in a much larger puzzle. Peters room is the one we zoom into and while he begins the tale as a small side character, his importance and centrality to plot is born out throughout the films runtime.
Annie delivers the eulogy at her mothers funeral. We learn a few things from Annies eulogy and the funeral scene. First, we learn that the relationship between her and her mother was tumultuous. She speaks of her mother in a way few would about a recently deceased parent. Her words are not overly aggressive. She doesn’t speak of her mother with disdain or vitriol. But she does let the viewer know that their relationship was tense. She describes her mother as hard to read, hard to please, and secretive. Words not typically used when eulogizing a loved one. The second thing we learn is that Annie is surprised at the number of people in attendance at her mothers funeral. From the sounds of things her mother wasn’t a necessarily pleasant person to be around. But yet, her wake is filled with people there to give their respects. It’s obviously a bit jarring for Annie but something she doesn’t belabor too much as her mother had secrets. The last thing we learn involves Charlie, Annies daughter and youngest child. Charlie is allergic to nuts, and loves Chocolate.
The next scene is the family at home, Annie working on her miniatures. She makes a living turning her life experiences into miniature froms of art. Her daughter has a similar hobby, but her art is definitively less aesthetically pleasing than her mothers. The handmade figurines scattered throughout her room are odd and macabre. They make the viewer feel uneasy. And her drawings are similarly unsettling. Showing among other things, her deceased grandmother in her coffin.
This is the first time Hereditary delves into the relationship between Charlie and her grandmother. It’s important to note the relationship Annie describes between Charlie and her mother. It’s clear that Charlie and her grandmother had a close relationship and that this was a point of contention for Annie. We wont learn until later the full extent of their relationship why its so, lets say, unique, but we learn at least now, that it made Annie uneasy.
The film then cuts to Annie looking through some of her mothers old belongings. She finds a note she left behind in a book on spiritualism that reads,
“My Darling, dear, beautiful Annie. Forgive me all the things I could not tell you. Please don’t hate me and try not to despair your losses. You will see in the end that they were worth it. Our sacrifice will pale next to the Rewards. Love Mommy”
Ari Aster describes Hereditary as a family tragedy and its heart, that’s exactly what this film is. Behind the supernatural, spiritual, and horror themes, hereditary is a film about a mother coping with her place in her family. The film begins with loss. The loss of her mother, and another loss takes place after the first act. Annie is learning to deal with the loss of her mother, a mother she by her own admission, doesn’t remember all too fondly. Her work as a mother is to keep her family together despite the constant tragedy befalling the Grahams.
We get our first bit of supernatural scares as Annie sees a faint ghostlike vision of her mother in the corner of her studio. As soon as she turns the light on her mom disappears, but its enough to freak her out before heading to bed and the film cuts to Charlie at school being chastised by her teacher for working on her figurines instead of her assignments. A bird then kamikazes itself into the window while the camera rests in a close frame on Charlies face. The action then moves to Peters class. Peter is bored, staring at girls in class, totally detached from the classwork in front of him and much more interested in smoking weed with his friends after class. The next scene is Charlies, outside after school, decapitating the recently deceased bird, presumably for one of her figurine projects. While she does this, a woman watches her from across the street. The music swells as the strange woman somewhere in her 40’s, smiles and waves at the child from afar.
Aster does a great job of providing exposition in this short 2 minute school sequence. Without dumping a bunch of stilted dialogue onto the audience, we get a strong sense for each of these children. Peter is just a normal high school teenager, much more interested in girls and partying than his actual schoolwork and Charlie is….odd. and maybe supernatural. The scene does nothing to outright state that she had a hand in the birds death, but it is heavily implied by the music and tight closeup of her face where she remains stoic as all the children gasp and discuss the bird amongst themselves. Then there is the case of the curious woman. No doubt one of Ellen’s friends, but her interest in Charlie seems unnatural. Almost as unnatural as Ellens attention was towards her granddaughter.
At home Annie enters her mothers old room. She is startled by the sight of it and has her husband lock the door to quell her uneasiness. Steven then receives a phone call from the local cemetery, letting him know that his late stepmothers grave has been desecrated. A fact he keeps from Annie and the rest of the family. Annie then leaves, stating she is going to a movie but instead attends a grief recovery meeting. The reason for her deceit is unclear, but in this brief exchange we get another exposition of the family. They all keep secrets from one another. Some keep secrets to protect the family, others keep secrets to protect themselves but everyone in the family is keeping their own secrets.
At the meeting Annie shares with strangers a bit of her grief. She wasn’t too close to her mom. They were estranged for many years and her mother suffered from Dissociative Identity disorder, an illness that causes someone to have multiple personalities. The family tragedies don’t end there. Her father died as a child, her brother committed suicide, leaving a note blaming their mother. Claiming she was trying to put people inside of him. Annies relationship with her mother worsened, her and her husband banned Ellen from seeing their first child, Peter, but when Charlie was born Annie allowed her mother and Charlie to have a relationship. A relationship Annie explains her mother took too far, sinking her hooks into Charlie and claiming ownership. Its clear Annie feels a lot of guilt, among other things, for not only her mothers death but also her mothers life.
The next scene is Charlie in her work shop. Creating her figurines, eating chocolate, and making a disturbing clicking sound with her mouth. She is deeply focused on her project, until a light, an almost mirror light refraction, glows past her and ends up on the wall. She is drawn to this light. Inexplicably and with no exposition to the audience.
A few more quick cuts show us a picture of Ellen feeding Charlie as a baby, Annie missing deadlines on her next art piece, and then back to Charlie, following the light before ending up in the front yard and sees a woman. Sitting in the grass, with fire burning around her.
Annie comes to retrieve Charlie, not seeing the woman that Charlie sees and drags her back inside. Annie is upset with Charlie and Charlie asks for her grandmother. Annie, being persistent, tells Charlie she is going to a school gathering with her brother. A hangout Peter describes as a “school BBQ”. Annie doesn’t believe this, but she goes along with the lie, instructing Peter simply not to drink. Peters lie adds to the familial theme of trust and secrets. No one in the family is entirely truthful with one another, and in turn no one in the family truly trusts each other. Annie would rather force Charlie on Peter than confront him on his lie. The Graham family is warped by deception. They trust no one and play their own little games with each other rather than being honest.
While driving to the party, the camera lingers eerily on a wooden telephone pole with an odd carving on it. It’s not instantly recognizable but on subsequent viewings its noticeable as the same symbol on Ellens necklace. The necklace she’s buried in. Aster uses subtle foreshadowing here, leaving the audience with no idea why this wooden pole is important, but feeling uneasy about its existence.
Peter immediately abandons his sister at the party, much more interested in girls and weed than entertaining his little sister. When Charlie tries to follow Peter, he persuades her to try some chocolate cake, a cake that everyone, except Charlie and Peter, is aware is filled with nuts. Her reaction is almost immediate, sending her into a wheezing frenzy before she finds a very stoned Peter and tells him something is wrong.
Peter rushes her to the car and furiously drives her to the hospital. Charlie is getting worse in the backseat, not able to breathe, gasping for air and convulsing in the backseat. She reaches her head out the window to get some air and Peter swerves to avoid hitting an animal carcass lying in the middle of the road. As he swerves, in one quick action shot, we see Charlies head make contact with pole as Peter screeches to a halt.
A major theme of this familial tragedy is one of trust. The members of this family do not trust each other, they lie constantly and no one steps up to call them out on their lies. They simply turn the other cheek and continue living their lives. Lives of secrecy, continuously breaking the trust of their closest loved ones.
Good horror also breaks the trust of its closest loved one, the audience. Take the jump scare for example. A simple technique that has been used for decades to scare the audience and break their trust. The most famous example of a successful jump scare is at the end of the 1980 film Friday the 13th. In the last five minutes of the film, the audience believes the movie is over. Alice, acting as the final girl for this film, has uncovered the mystery of camp crystal lake. She’s unmasked the mysterious killer and brought an end to the night of violence they’ve all endured. Alice waits patiently in a canoe on the lake while police forces arrive. The score, which throughout has been a series of unsettling clicks and noises layered on top of sharp menacing strings, is now triumphant. The killer is gone, and the final girl remains. All that’s left is for the credits to roll. But as the camera moves in on Alice, her in the canoe, the film breaks the audience trust one more time by giving us a final jump scare with Jason leaping from the lake and grabbing Alice around the neck.
Charlies is death is the beginning of Hereditary breaking the audiences trust. The marketing for the film, up to and including the movie poster, all prominently featured Charlie. Her face and strange mouth clicking sound is what got people into the theaters. Hereditary by name and marketing seemed to be a film about a possessed child. This possessed child. To kill her off in the first half hour of the movie was shocking not just because of how she was killed, but that she was even killed at all. The main protagonist, the girl we thought would be the big bad of the film, is now gone. Hereditary breaks the audience’s trust and continues to move on. Quietly and methodically. Delving deeper into this family’s tragedy.
Peter, stoned and shocked by what just happened, does the only thing he can think of. He drives back home. He doesn’t frantically drive to a hospital, he doesn’t wake his parents, he simply heads home and goes to bed. Leaving his sisters headless body to be discovered the next day by an uncontrollably grieved mother.
The subsequent montage is one of grief, terror, and utter hopelessness. We see Peters face, he is despondent. Unable to process the trauma of killing his sister. We see Annie, writhing in pain, visceral grief that can only come from a mother losing a child. We see a coffin, a small coffin, being lowered into the ground. The wake, where Peter doesn’t even attempt to be seen, and Annie unable to even move out of bed. And finally the father, Steven, trying his best to keep a family together while maintaining composure.
Annie sleeps in the treehouse, Steven views his late daughters note book, and Peter tries numb the visions of his headless sister with weed induced panic attacks. Everyone is wrestling with the loss in their own way, by themselves, continuing their secret lives but now with an unbearable weight of loss and guilt.
Annie attempts to go to another survivors meeting, but never leaves the parking lot of her car. She tries to leave but is caught by Joan, a concerned fellow griever played by Anne Dowd. Joan introduces herself to Annie as a friend, someone who also lost a son, and a grandson. She leaves Annie her phone number as a gesture of good will. Someone she can talk to, whenever Annie feels up to it.
A few days later Annie reaches out to Joan. She heads to her apartment and notices an odd detail. A welcome mat, embroidered in the same manner as the one her mother used to make. A small detail, in a film full of small details. The difference though is that this detail is typically noticed on the first viewing. Hereditary rewards multiple watches with small hard to catch items scattered throughout the film. Theres the symbol on the pole, the black leaves in Annies tea, and seemingly inconsequential funeral guests who are seen scattered throughout the film, but this detail is subtle yet obvious. Annie says it out loud, and Joan quickly dismisses her. It’s the first real notion that Joan may not be exactly who she says she is. And her intentions may not have Annies best interests at heart.
Get Create/Context’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
Annie pours her soul to Joan. Weeping at the table recalling how she found Charlies body. Joan asks about Annies relationship with Peter, Annie recalls a disturbing story where she slept walk into Charlie and Peters room, doused them with paint thinner with the intention of lighting them all on fire. Joan doesn’t seemed shocked by this story and Annie seems more perturbed than horrified.
We know from earlier in the film that Annie’s family has a history of mental illness, but this is the first time we begin to see that maybe the illness is…hereditary. That Annie may be suffering from it as well. Rather than seek any help, talk to a professional about it, Annie continues her life, upset at those around her who don’t understand. To her, this was just a sleepwalking incident, and nothing to worry about. But for everyone else. For the kids who were awoken by their mother standing over their bed ready to set them ablaze, this isn’t a small incident. Annie continues to shift blame and downplay this problem, the same way she shifts and downplays every problem in her life. Avoidance. And intolerance for anyone who wishes to deal with the problem differently. It’s here where we begin to see the origins of the families secretive nature. It’s easier to lie than to explain. If they had to explain, then they would have to plan their next move. Seek help, change their actions, forge a new path forward. If they lie, keep the secret, then they can pretend its all not a big deal. Just a misunderstanding. The result of a sleepwalk.
Steven visits Annie in her workshop and sees her working on a new miniature. A recreation of Charlies death. The film has already shown us Steven and Annie growing apart, but now it’s showing us a new family thread. Annie’s disdain for Peter, her own son. It’s clear to everyone, except Annie, that she blames Peter for the accident.
At Dinner that night, their tension comes to a head. Peter turns the blame back on Annie, before Steven shuts the conversation down. The scene ends with Annie furiously storming off, leaving Peter and Steven to finish their dinner in silence. The film continuously uses the still lingering shots to make the audience uncomfortable. When Annie leaves, the camera is positioned in the living room, not at the dinner table. We watch this scene, the final tense moments, from a fly on the wall perspective. The audience lingers in the background, feeling uneasy but not directly with the family. We are observing from a distance the family tearing itself apart.
Annie attempts to continue her work but it is clear her motivation is gone. She has no desire to go on with her projects but persists non the less. On a trip to the art supply store she runs into Joan. Annie believes this is an odd happenstance, nothing more than a coincidence, but the audience is beginning to realize that with Joan there are no coincidences. Despite her joyful friendly demeanor, there is something more sinister at play. Joan seems a lot happier than when we last left her. She tells Annie of an amazing development in her life with the same furvert as a youth pastor spreading the gospel to a group of uninterested teens. She has found a way to talk to her grandson. Through a séance with a spiritual medium. Annie, after consistent pestering from Joan, agrees to go back to her apartment and conduct a séance.
Hereditary continues to play with the audiences trust. Up until this point in the film, there have been no direct supernatural elements. The film toyed with these ideas and notions, Charlie and the bird, Annie seeing her mothers ghost, but nothing outright unexplainable has happened. The next scene, Annie at the séance with Joan, is where the film truly dives into supernatural elements, leaving the audience unsure about what type of film we are watching.
Annie seems truly terrified by what she is seeing, but Joan coaches Annie through it. It’s pretty clear that this isn’t Joans first, or second time conducting a séance. She has experience, she’s comforting and reassuring to Annie. This is nothing out of the ordinary for Joan. The only time we see any cracks starting to form in Joan is when Annie asks to stop. Joan is visibly frustrated by this, but then quickly regains her composure, reassuring Annie, telling her its going to be okay and giving her instructions for how to do this at home. How Annie can reach Charlie.
The beginning of Hereditary, the first two acts really, are a slow terrifying burn. For the first hour plus, the movie is nothing more than a close portrait of a grieving a family. A family that begins dysfunctional and slowly delves deeper into the grief. The more tragedy that happens to this family, the farther they push away from one another. And the movie makes you dwell there. In the families grief and misery. Before Joan enters the picture, the film is almost entirely subtext. A familial tragedy being pushed forward by grief and terror. It isn’t a horror movie in the traditional sense, it’s a horror movie in the real life sense. By pushing all these everyday horrors to the forefront, the audience feels the dread and lives in it with Annie and her family. But now the film begins to change, subtly at first, but then more direct.
Annie at home, begins to have visions, nightmares. She’s sleepwalking again and enters Peters room, standing at his bed, asking where Charlies is, before delivering some brutal news to her now only child. She tells Peter she tried to have a miscarriage but it didn’t take. Her dialogue with Peter continues, escalating in extreme ways with Peter scared and Annie inconsolable, until Annie finally strikes a match, setting them both ablaze and finally waking up from a vivid nightmare
Annie wakes up the entire family, apologizing and telling them she has figured it out. And that she is going to do….something.
Its becoming increasingly clear that Annie is unwell. She wasn’t okay before the death of her mother and daughter, but now she has nothing to keep her grounded. Her life, her work, her family, are all in turmoil. And Joan is taking advantage of her grief. By giving her hope, the chance to speak with her daughter again. Joan is not only playing off of Annies grief, but also her mental illness. It isn’t clear to the viewer yet what Joans true intentions are, but its clear her work is going to have massive consequences to this already grieving family.
Annie, being unwell, and the film leaning into this with her nightmares and exposition of her trauma, keeps the audience in suspense about what we are seeing. We don’t know if we can trust anything we see on screen because we are seeing it through Annies lens. She convinces the family to participate in the same ritual Joan had her do earlier. Like with Joan, the ritual works. Each family member has a different, yet distinct reaction to the glass moving. Annie, is elated. She has just proven to the family of skeptics that she isn’t crazy. She is lucid and she can speak with the dead. Peter, is visibly shaken. Terrified by what is happening. And Steven, is shocked. At a loss for words.
Steven is the least developed of the main characters in Hereditary, but that feels purposeful as his lack of development allows us as the audience to project ourselves onto him. Peter, Charley, and Annie are all deeply fleshed out characters with fears and emotions laid clear throughout the film, but Steven, is just a bystander. He is barely a participant in his own family, trying his hardest to keep a family together, regardless of how desperately they are trying to tear themselves apart. Because of this, Stevens reaction gets to be our own. The first séance in the film could have easily been a trick by Joan. One she uses to prey on a fragile mentally unstable woman. The visions and aspirations that Annie see could all be attributed to her families history of mental health. Her sleepwalking, her brothers DID, her mothers secrecy. But now, seeing Steven in awe. Shocked, bewildered, and even a little scared, we understand there’s something more going on than just a family tragedy. This is a true horror movie, one with monsters, told through the lens of a family on the brink of collapse.
Annie continues with the ritual, bringing out Charlies notebook for her to write in. The music swells as Annie becomes more and more determined in her process, Peter’s anxiety getting the best of him and Steven, though he doesn’t know exactly what’s going on, knows it isn’t good. A candle lit in the middle of the table to invite the undead spirits, rages bright before being extinguished. Annie seemingly possessed, groans in an unearthly tone before falling deeper and deeper into a state of trance and finally becoming possessed by someone. Something. Steven is finally able to snap her out of it by throwing water in her face. A classic cinema trope. And he consoles his shaken son while Annie stares blankly, unaware of the torment she’s just put her family through.
The next scene jumps to Peter at school, sweaty and scared. Unable to focus on his studies and haunted by floating lights and visions of an evil doppelganger. Steven calls Annie to tell her their son is in dire conditions, that he needs help. Annie like she always does, denies any and all blame for Peters conditions. Rather than own up to her mistake, take responsibility and attempt to move forward, she lashes out and continues to deflect the burden onto everyone around here. But this time, Annie has done more than just emotional damage. She has invited a spirit into the home. And while she was tricked into doing so, there is still blame on her hands.
On a first watch through, Hereditary is a mystery. The film constantly plays with the audience, never letting us know what is real and what isn’t. The trust between the film and audience is constantly broken and we never truly know what is real, what is a dream, a hallucination, or the spiral of a mad women. Subsequent viewings though show that the trust we have with the film and filmmaker is not actually broken. Everything is as it seems. No matter how far fetched, how outlandish, what we see is real and is really happening to this family.
The objectivity of whether or not this works, this demonic possession story embedded into a family tragedy, has been the subject of countless debates. There are some who argue that it destroys the nature of the film by giving a concrete explanation for the horrors the family are facing while others enjoy the mystery and having a tangible explanation that can be unlocked through analysis and discussion.
Personally, I believe the supernatural elements work because it provides a satisfying subtext to theme of trust that’s layered throughout the film. No one in this family trusts anyone. They all keep their secrets and make their plans unbeknownst to the ones who care for them the most. But the film doesn’t break our trust. It shows us unexplainable, unbelievable things and asks us, just trust me. It’ll all come together in the end. If you want to read the film as just a family tragedy. A deep dive into grief, sorrow, and secrets, then that is all there. Hereditary is drowning in subtext all happening just below the surface of an evil spirit. But if you want a horror movie. A supernatural thriller with mysteries and hidden messages to uncover, that’s there too. And both films are superb in their execution.
Annie enters Charlies room and sees her notebook writing on its own. Flipping page through page, drawing different variations of the same thing over and over. Peter lies in his bed, hearing his sisters clicks. The ghost of Charlie stands in the corner of his room. She looks at Peter and then her head rolls off before turning into a volleyball. Peter is violently pulled back into bed, hands coming from behind the frame attempting to pull his head off. After the door slams, Annie is seen in his room, trying to console Peter. The camera then returns to Charlies room, slowly zooming into her notebook. We can see what the spirit was drawing. It was Peter, screaming in terror, eyes crossed out. Annie grabs the notebook, understanding there is something evil in the house. Something she let in. And it’s living in the book.
She takes the notebook and tosses it in their family fireplace, but as the book begins to burn, catching fire on the edges, her shirt catches fire. The flame increasing in intensity the more the book burns. Annie tells no one of this. She won’t confide in her family or tell them what’s going on. Rather than trust the family, to work together to try and quell this evil, she does what she always does. Trusts no one and tries to fix the problem in secrecy. She goes back to Joans apartment but its locked. The camera pans in and we see the true nature of Joans home. The apartment is filled with burning candles, intricate symbols, and on the dining room table, the one where she first taught Annie how to conjure a spirit, is a picture of Peter and figurines from Charley.
Annie sees the floor mat and realizes what is going on. Not exactly what’s going on, but that whatever is happening to her, her family, maybe even Charley, all had something to do with her mother.
Peter stares into the void at a lunch table outside of school. He looks like he hasn’t slept in days. Joan is then seen on the other side of the school fence, chanting and yelling at Peter. Annie returns home, furiously searching through her mother’s things, finding numerous floor mats with the same eerie symbol on it. She eventually stumbles on a book of invocations, with sections for the demon Paimon highlighted. Lastly, in a scrap book of photos from her mother, she finds pictures of Joan, pictures of her family, and photos of her mothers group praying over these photos. Her mother wanted to summon the demon Paimon into Peter, but she couldn’t. Annie wouldn’t let her. So she did with Charley, but Charley wasn’t the proper host. Charley was a female and Paimon, being male desired a male body. With her mother gone, a plan was put into motion by the cult. A plan to rectify Paimons host body. A plan that needed to be carried out by Annie herself.
Annie opens the door to the attic and is immediately hit with a wretched smell and infestation of flies In the attic, she makes a disturbing discovery. Her mothers body, headless and decaying. Peter continues to have visions and hallucinations at school. His body contorts until he forcibly smashes his head against his desk, causing fear and confusion in the classroom, with no one more horrified than Peter himself.
Steve drives Peter home from school. Annie, shocked at her sons condition but realizing there are more sinister deeds at play, begs her husband to go into the attic. She tells him what’s up there. Steve, horrified by the body in the attic, comes down to ask his wife what is going on. Annie, for the first time in the film, maybe in her life, decides to tell him the truth. She decides to trust him. Steve just stares her, barely listening to his wife’s ramblings. He doesn’t believe her. And why would he? Her story is inconceivable. The ramblings of a mad woman. And she’s never trusted him before, never trusted him enough to tell him what’s truly going on. Now, when she does finally tell the truth. Finally gives her husband a little bit of trust, he dismisses her and tells her she needs help.
In a traditional horror film, this would be the moment the family comes together to fight the evil that’s entered their house. Steve would believe his wife, come to her aid, and do whatever they could to expel the demon from their house. But this isn’t a traditional horror film. It’s a family tragedy. The tragedy isn’t just Ellens death that begins the film. It isn’t Charley’s death, a cataclysmic event that forever changes the family’s dynamic. The tragedy is a family so dysfunctional, so distrustful, so full of secrecy, that when they need to come together, when the only way they can survive is to trust each other and work as one, as a real family unit, it’s impossible. The task at hand is too great for one and the family too fractured to mend. There is no happy ending to this film. No epic fight, the forces of good against the forces of evil. The demon wins. And it isn’t even a struggle.
Annie begs Steve to throw Charley’s book in the fire, convinced that two things will happen. First, it will rid the house of the demon. And second it will burn her alive. Steve refuses. He tells Annie she needs help and he won’t indulge her anymore. Annie takes the book from Steve and throws it into the fire. Two things happen. One, Steve burns alive. Second, the demon, being free from the notebook, enters Annie.
The film then moves to an exterior shot of the house during the day, then an immediate cut to the house at night, the property infested with nude Paemon worshipers.
Peter wakes up and sees a light on in the treehouse. He doesn’t notice his mother in the corner of his room, pinned to the ceiling, where she stays for a minute before scurrying away. Peter exits his room, searching for either his mom or dad. He wanders through the house, finding his father’s burnt corpse and realizing he’s not alone in the house. A familiar face is in the corner of the room. A mourner from Ellens wake. Completely nude and smiling at Peter. The same way he smiled at Charley in the beginning of the film. A possessed Annie rushes from the corner of the room and chases Peter into the attic, where he locks the door as she furiously beats her head against the ceiling trying to get in. For all the dread, grief, and slow anxiety inducing buildup in Hereditary, the film also handles traditional horror in a unique and effective way. The last fifteen minutes or so of Hereditary are pure terror. The puzzle pieces are there to solve the mystery but even so the result is still terrifying and brought to life by Alex Wolff in his portrayal of Peter. Before this role, Alex was best known for being a child actor on the Nickelodeon TV show, the naked brothers band. Being cast in Hereditary gave him the opportunity to prove he was more than a child star and could take on serious roles. The role here of Peter is complex and allows him the opportunity to show off multiple disciplines like grief, despondency, and most importantly fear. The ending of the film follows Peter, a character who has felt like supporting cast for the entire movie. He is now placed front and center and, with Steve dead, acting as the eyes of the audience. The audience has a better idea of what is going on than Peter but for the most part, and especially on an initial viewing, we are in the dark about everything that has happened and will happen. We experience this ending with Peter, the true horror and fear that Aster has crafted in these last fifteen minutes. Peter is scared by this experience and wants nothing more than for this to end.
Annie eventually makes her way into the attic. How is never explained, but Peter sees her, floating against the ceiling, decapitating herself with piano wire. Peter jumps out the window while his mom finishes the ritual. Killing herself and allowing the spirit to enter Peter. Peter, now possessed by Paimon, rises and heads for the treehouse. He follows her headless body and makes the same strange clicking noise that Charley used to make. The score drastically changes. The sharp extended high notes meant to cause fear and anxiety are now triumphant orchestrations. When Peter enters the treehouse he sees his followers, bowing, awaiting him. They kneel before him and an idol made with Charley’s decapitated head. If there is still any confusion for the audience, Joan comes in for exposition. She places a crown on Peters head. She calls him Charley and then explains that he is Paimon. One of the eight kings of hell. Peters body, like Charley’s was in the beginning, is now just a host for demon the king. The camera zooms out of the treehouse to expose a set similar to the one we zoomed in on at the beginning of the film. We see Peter, surrounded by his followers, bowing and worshipping their newly hosted king.
Hereditary was a record setting financial success for A24. The small 10 million dollar budget raked in 82 million at the box office, becoming A24’s highest grossing film until being dethroned by Everything Everywhere All At Once in 2022. The film was also a critical success, with Rolling Stone calling Toni Collete’s performance the best of her career and The AV club comparing it to prestige horror films like The Exorcist and Rosemarys Baby. The film was not as well received by standard movie goers, scoring a full 20 points lower than the critics score on rotten tomatoes and a D+ grade on Cinemascores audience poll. It’s not uncommon for a film to have a discrepancy between the audience and the critic score. Hereditary is a standout because even with the tempered response from fans, people still showed up in droves to see this movie. The reason I believe this film polarized audiences so much, directly relates to one of the films major themes. Trust.
This was Ari Asters first featured film, so people really didn’t know what they would be getting from the young director. The marketing also portrayed a, for lack of a better genre, a creepy kid film. The expectation going into Hereditary is that we would see a lot of Milly Shapiro as Charley. She would be the crux of the film, causing havoc in sinister ways. Aster then kills her off in the first thirty minutes, spends the next hour dwelling in this families grief, emotionally gut punching the audience, before sending it deep down a demonic rabbit hole that no one was expecting. On the surface, Ari Aster is breaking the audiences trust at every turn. The film is different than its marketed, he spends a lot of time providing clues but very little exposition until the end. It’s easy to see how a moviegoer would feel lost, maybe even betrayed, by this film. If you came to this movie expecting a film like the Omen or even Goodnight Mommy, you were in for a rude awakening. But if you put your trust in the director. If you allow yourself to go on the ride he’s taking you, you’ll find both a deep family tragedy and a terrifying, competent horror film.
