by Chris Feil
This year has made for a quiet Sundance Film Festival, no? While there seems to be less word on major deals and potential Oscar players in the year to come, one premiere that has quickly become must-see material is Ari Aster's horror debut Hereditary. Cryptic reviews have promised genuine genre scares and (much to our excitement) a worthy showcase for Toni Collette. Collette's co-stars include Ann Dowd and Gabriel Byrne.
The film centers on a family after the death of their not-so-beloved grandmother. Her artist daughter (played by Collette) deals with the increasingly spooky fallout...
Early word has vehemently guarded the film's twists and surprises and A24 will release the film later in the year. It sounds like the actress has finally been given tour de force material that she's long deserved and rarely gets anymore. The film reportedly begins as more of a family drama before tilting into full-on scares, so she also should get to flex her underappreciated range.
We're not usually horror hungry here at The Film Experience, but this sounds like a something we can all get behind, especially if A24 sticks to keeping Hereditary's secrets under wraps. And with some hefty comparisons to the likes of Rosemary's Baby, The Babadook, and Collette's own Oscar nominated performance in The Sixth Sense being thrown around, it sounds like something terrifying and special indeed.
