How the Film “Hereditary” Transformed the Horror Genre
We all have ideas on how a scary or “horror” movie should be. It should be chock full of jump-scares and the such, correct? Wrong. In his film “Hereditary,” Ari Aster produced and directed a horror film that would change the genre as we see it. Most horror movies portray almost simple events and situations that may or may not affect the audience in any way. “Hereditary” brought forth existential issues concerning a family whose mother suffers from certain problems that affects how the acts throughout the story. The film puts forth visual and auditory nuances that affect the audience, whether it be the score so well-orchestrated that it makes the audience feel uneasy; or the isolationistic visuals that the film portrays so well. In his film “Hereditary,” Ari Aster had a vision on how he wanted the film to follow and how the characters to change and subsequently affect the story.
To begin, Ari Aster had a certain vision on how he wanted “Hereditary” to pan out; which very much shows in the script. Aster describes how he was “[very] inspired by the baffled misery that humans can feel when confronted by unexpected tragedy,” regarding to the events that following suit after the death of the grandmother and Charlie (Hawkes 1). When a horror movie is made, a director should have an idea or “vision” pertaining to how he wants to get under the audience’s skin. Aster wholly did just that. No horror movie had ever emotionally disturbed me as much as this one did. It took me days to get over how disturbing and psychologically abhorrent the movie is. But it is an absolute masterpiece and (to me) the textbook definition of a “horror film.” Ari Aster envisioned the movie to “slowly unravel” or be a slow burner, because in my opinion; that’s the best way to produce a horror film. In a horror film, you want to slowly-burn the plot to keep your audience engaged, keep them wanting to care about the characters (if they even do care) and Aster set out to do just that. In the script, Aster intelligently wrote out a certain scene that existentially shocked the audience and Peter when Charlie is sadly decapitated on the way to the hospital. After Charlie is decapitated the script describes how in the car “Peter sits motionless…Paralyzed,” showing us the same amount of shock and unsettlement between the audience and Peter. As Aster stated that he knows that the audience is shocked by unexpected events, he gives us just that in that specific scene. We don’t know at the time that Charlie is about to die in that way, of course we assume that they are going to make it to the hospital in time so Charlie can get treated and go along with her life. But in that specific scene, especially when the shot transitions to that of the telephone poll; it hits us (literally). We sit there in arrant and unmitigated shock as to what has just occurred, just as Peter does in that scene. Just as we are in shock, we don’t know how to feel, how to react to what we have just witnessed, so is Peter. This is exactly what Ari Aster visualized/set-out to do, he wanted to use this unfortunate event to set off a chain reaction of events to follow in the movie. A director’s vision in a horror film is everything, it can absolutely ruin it if not executed well; but in the case of “Hereditary,” absolutely terrify.
In the same way, Ari Aster developed his characters a certain way so the audience would feel attached to them and as a result feel impacted by what occurs in the story. Characters are always essential to any story, especially horror films. They can tell the story in many ways, such as how it is affecting them, the environment, or things around them. In “Hereditary,” Aster developed his characters to where they had an immense amount of backstory, with most if not all of that backstory affecting the other characters. For instance, Annie’s mother suffered from disorders that affected her whole family at the time; and this subsequently affecting Annie’s own family further down the line. Aster described how “[the family is] ‘being manipulated by outside forces,’” showing us that in this movie the characters do indeed change, but do not really have any amount of free-will in those decisions. In the script, Annie describes how she “’made a pact with something’” when they attempted to bring back Charlie via a séance; but incidentally brought the evil into their home by doing so (thus changing the story) (Aster 108). Regarding the doll house/art exhibit that Annie creates slowly “become[s] a motif” in the story. When Annie is working on her art pieces, she obviously is and feels in control, since she is controlling every movement and artistic style that is put into it. With that being said, it can be speculated that Annie wants to feel in control of her own life/family just as she is in her art pieces; leading to the eventual collapse of her family as a result of the cult’s infernal coercion on everyone involved. Ari Aster wanted to develop the characters in a way where they so ultimately affect the story in many ways and/or wrote them so well that we cared about them and when something happens to them, we are in disbelief.
Hereditary (R) is now out on DVD.
Some quotes obtained from the Hereditary script by Ari Aster.
Image obtained from: A24