10 Movies Nobody Could Stop Thinking About
3. Hereditary
Even hardened horror fans were left positively shook by Ari Aster's directorial debut Hereditary, a film that's clearly about grief from its very opening scene, and yet confronts the subject in a soul-searing way just about nobody saw coming.
The marketing sold Hereditary as a well-crafted horror film about a woman, Annie (Toni Collette), coming to terms with her mother's death, all while her home is assailed by an increasingly intense supernatural presence.
Yet the trailers quite ingeniously circumscribed the true tragedy of Annie's life - a horrific accident which occurs in the movie's first act and consequently offers up one of the most authentic depictions of traumatised grief cinema has ever seen.
Toni Collette's bafflingly Oscar-snubbed performance in the lead role is mesmerising, and Aster has such a confident handle on his movie's thickly anxiety-inducing tone that it's tough to believe he'd never directed a feature before.
When it's all said and done, Hereditary is a movie that gets in your pores, enough that you'll literally want to shower it off you - or, at least, watch something totally frothy and disposable afterwards.