shawnwu

Hereditary was a terrifying blend of reality and the supernatural, with the horror stemming from the realism. The film was most terrifying when wallowing in the stress of tragic events and their effects on a strained family dynamic. Toni Collette and Alex Wolff delivered gut-wrenching performances as mother and son faced with impossible situations. The film also continuously hinted at an ambitious mythology that provided suspense, but in the last five minutes it felt the need to tie up the mystery with an over-explained sequence that read more like a conclusion to a Law and Order episode than the end to an otherwise excellent film. In all, the film was shocking and beautiful, but suffered from its last minute tonal shift.

The best thing about this movie was that it was instantly forgettable. The tone of the movie repeatedly changed throughout the film and there was a drastic mismatch in the acting abilities of the two leads. However intentional, the actor-director's fumbling bumbling idiocy and stale humor was excruciating. Taylor Schilling added a bit of life to the mix, but she wasn't given much to work with. The plot might have succeeded as a quirky short film, but at 83 minutes it was painful. It seemed that the director assumed his character's toupee would suffice as a major plot line.

The Take: We're not movie critics, but we might be better.

This comedy wasn't full of laughs, but it didn't tell much of a story either. It simply drifted. The soundtrack forces the movie to read as a romantic comedy, and is oddly pensive and optimistic at moments when people are being gunned down. Perhaps the film was actually meant to be a romantic comedy. Despite being about an independent female reporter in Afghanistan, the most interesting storyline is Kim's relationship with Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman). I did enjoy how as the movie progressed, the once scary and threatening Afghanistan had turned into "home" for Kim.