Hereditary (2018)

Hereditary opens with the death notice, then funeral, of grandmother Ellen Taper Leigh.

Initially, the story then revolves around the reactions of her surviving family to this loss: emotional artist daughter Annie (Toni Collette), who crafts miniature dioramas; Annie's matter-of-fact husband, Steve (Gabrielle Bryne); and their teenage children, Charlie (Milly Shapiro), who becomes rather death-obsessed after her gran's passing, and Peter (Alex Wolff), who just wants to smoke weed and hang with his mates.

Coming from a family with a history of mental illness, Annie didn't really get on with her mum, but loved her nonetheless.

But if that wasn't enough grief, an unexpected tragic accident leaves the family in a state of traumatised shock, with Annie eventually turning to a friend she makes at grief counselling, Joan (the incredible Ann Dowd, of The Leftovers and The Handmaid's Tale), for comfort and guidance.

Joan tells Annie about a spiritualist ritual for contacting the dead, and that's when the weird stuff really truly begins.

Hereditary is difficult to get into at first, because writer/director Ari Aster wants to keep his audience on the back-foot, so they're not trying to second-guess the story.

What starts as a shocking family drama, swerves into almost mainstream horror territory with some seemingly ghostly goings-on, before taking a left turn into Lovecraftian territory, and finally plunging headlong into the WTF zone!

If you surrender yourself to this film, and can stay off your mobile phone for just over two hours, you will be rewarded with an intense experience that, while not wholly original, is made so well it will remind you of true genre classics like The Exorcist, The Omen, Rosemary's Baby etc

This is smart horror, not jump scares; this is things moving in your peripheral vision, strange sounds and odd reflections.

Because of Annie's mental health issues, the film constantly flirts with the unreliable narrator trope: is what we are seeing really happening or is it a hallucination?

This, of course, also works to keep the audience fixated on what's occurring onscreen, and also off-balance because we are constantly questioning the goings-on unfolding before our eyes.

The disorientating and surreal atmosphere is accentuated by some sudden jump cuts and other camera trickery. Clearly the director has a very particular vision in mind and goes to great lengths to sell it to his audience.

While there is death and all that entails, this isn't a film for gorehounds, but that makes the shocks more powerful and personal, as you're not desensitised by buckets of blood.

The central characters behave (almost, within the limits of a cinematic world) like real human beings, (a pleasant change for the genre); when exposed to the apparent supernatural they don't take it in their stride, there's panic, tears, and denial.

I also suspect the film will require repeat viewing to pick up on all the clues that lay the groundwork for the bizarre finale.

Unfortunately, a couple of moments strain credibility somewhat: the shocking accident I referred to never appears to be investigated by the police and then, later on, Peter is badly hurt when he has a "fit" at school, but - although he gets a splint for his broken nose (presumably from the school nurse) - it's never even suggested that he should go to hospital, and, given what a dramatic incident it is, that seems rather peculiar.

Both of these flaws are clearly there to serve the narrative - as letting reality intrude too heavily could have derailed the story in major ways - which is a shame, because the rest of the film is magnificent.

Despite its seemingly slow start, by the third act I was so sucked in that I wanted at least another half-hour of the Hereditary madness.

Unlike the bulk of genre movies pumped out these days, Hereditary is not disposable fare to be forgotten within an hour of switching off the television or walking out of the cinema.

There's every possibility this will get under your skin and haunt your dreams.

Which I reckon is good value for money.