Starring Hugh Grant, Heretic is the latest in a growing wave of modern religious horror movies. With spoilers, a look at what it might mean…
NB: The following contains spoilers for Heretic. You have been warned.
Religion and horror have been common partners for decades. Filmmakers from William Friedkin to Rose Glass have faced head on God and the Devil, priests versus demons, and the nature of good and evil. Heretic, however, suggests we’re in for a new offshoot of the traditional religious horror film.
You could classify Scott Beck and Bryan Woods’ film as ‘theological horror’, given it focuses specifically on religion without portraying a conventional story of the Devil, demonic possession or any number of well-worn religious movie tropes. In Heretic, the evil concerns faith and what happens when someone such as Hugh Grant’s sinister Mr Reed throws into question everything we believe in.
Heretic admittedly approaches its subject with tongue firmly in cheek. Nobody’s likely to accuse it of blasphemy as some did with Ken Russell’s The Devils (1971). Beck and Woods allow Grant’s villain to carry the film with a sinister twinkle in his eye, delivering reams of dialogue in theatrical fashion without ever straying into pomposity. He even mentions The Phantom Menace at one point.
What their film does do, however, is question the nature of belief through Reed’s interaction with a pair of missionaries: Sisters Barnes and Paxton (Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East) whom Reed lures into his trap. Reversing the traditional Christian practice of inviting people to learn more about Christ, Reed gives the terrified sisters his own lecture about the fallacy of monotheism, specifically Judaism, Christianity and Islam, which he places under one metaphorical roof.
These are not by any means new ideas. Beck and Woods show invention by tethering them, allegorically, to Radiohead or bringing Star Wars into the mix, but the idea of the ‘big three’ main religions all sharing a common story that predates them by millennia in Egyptian or Indian cultures has been around for centuries. What Reed argues – that polytheism evolved over time into the worship of a singular god – isn’t new, but it’s rare that we see these ideas covered in genre storytelling.
Religious horror will often focus on the Christian interpretation of evil in the form of the Devil or through some form of demon. The Exorcist (1973) and The Omen (1976) were the two biggest examples to emerge during a 1970s, both of which brought anxieties about the corrupting nature of religion into the mainstream.. It could be argued they anticipated the so-called ‘Satanic Panic’ that gripped America during the 1980s.
Heretic, however, eschews demons or devils, with the only sop to traditional horror being the hunched woman who serves up ‘prophecy’ as part of Reed’s gambit. That too is proven to be much more of a mundane fallacy as Heretic works to find its horror in what the two Mormon sisters are forced to confront: belief or disbelief. Rationality over faith. Reed attempts to try and place into context how, in his mind, they’ve been hoodwinked, as have the billions throughout recorded history, into believing in a rigid system of control that has no bearing on truth.
In a different context, Reed’s argument recalls Margaret White, the mother from Brian de Palma’s adaptation of Stephen King’s Carrie (1976), as played fiercely by Piper Laurie. She’s so rigidly devout in her beliefs, and so powerfully channels this into what she says to her daughter, Carrie, that she becomes that same system of absolute control Reed argues organised religion to be. “He’s gonna laugh at you! They’re all gonna laugh at you!” Margaret tells Carrie before the start of the fateful prom she attends. Much as Sister Paxton in Heretic is ‘pantsed’ and laughed at by ‘normal’ teenage girls at the beginning of the film.
Sister Paxton is a potential Carrie figure, it could be argued. Not very worldly, quite naive, much more so than her compatriot Sister Barnes. The film even begins with them discussing sex and condoms in an awkward way, with it clear Barnes is suppressing the deeper knowledge and experience on this subject she has. Paxton ends up being subjected by the end to that same system of control, precisely because she’s willing to waver in a manner Barnes is not. When presented with two doors, one belief and one disbelief, Paxton is prepared to lie and go through the latter while Barnes holds to her convictions. To believe is to retain control, which is why Reed focuses on Paxton, as he knows she is controllable.
When you consider this in the context of religion, you can understand why some might agree, in broad strokes, with Reed’s assessment. Young people often are indoctrinated into a belief system which becomes their only experience making their faith an unprovable thesis. What you don’t often see in horror cinema is such a thesis being challenged. Religious horror often wants to punish you if you don’t believe, if you refuse to accept the supernatural reality of the Christian interpretation of evil; or if you are sinful enough to have allowed a demon to take you, often represented in girls not as virtuous as they should be, or girls like Carrie for whom womanhood grows into an uncontrollable power that her mother considers witchcraft.
In another such horror, Barnes might well have ended up possessed by a Pazuzu or Abraxas; a beautiful, sinful girl who has tasted the flesh and now denies it. Heretic’s theological horror, however, is concerned with not testing virtue, but faith. How powerfully should we believe even when the evidence suggests the contrary? Are we happy to relinquish control of our agency in the belief a higher power exists? A higher power giving us meaning, laying out a plan? Millions do, and I’m not convinced Heretic wants us to believe Reed is anything other than a creepy psychopath by the conclusion, but the theological horror it exposes feels a terrifying, underdeveloped corner of religious horror cinema.
One reason we might well see this particular avenue grow across this decade is the developing theocratic strain emerging in American society and politics. This piece is being written mere days before the next Presidential election, and whether Donald Trump is re-elected or not, few can deny that his policies, particularly as relating to abortion rights, have galvanised the fundamentalist Christian right in the United States following the repeal of Roe vs Wade. They wish to remove women’s right to choose, which is precisely what Reed ultimately does after testing his own religious thesis.
Therefore as America edges closer to outright theocracy, will we see more films such as Heretic tackling the horror of extreme theology? Certainly, the appearance of such films as Immaculate and The First Omen points to a growing wave of religiously-themed films about bodily autonomy. Will horror cinema now introduce more monsters like Reed who serve as avatars for ultimate control over women and their bodies? Quite possibly. Because what after all, is scarier: believing in nothing or losing the ability to choose what you believe entirely?
Heretic is in cinemas now.
You can find A J. on social media, including links to his podcasts and books, via Linktr.ee here. For more on Heretic, check out his podcast Modern Horror on the Film Stories Podcast Network on all podcatchers or here.
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