It’s no controversial take that A24 is the most exciting “mini-major” distributor in Hollywood right now, and while it’s inspiring to see it play with higher and higher budgets (Alex Garland’s Civil War is currently the studio’s most expensive film at $50 million; a number that its Christmas 2025 sports drama Marty Supreme will beat by $20 million), it’s those storied A24 indie horror chops that excite like no other.
The current A24 horror all-star is Heretic, having dropped into theaters this past November before going on to rank as the 10th-highest grossing film in the studio’s whole library. The 91% critic approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes is but another cherry on top, second only to the fact that it earned each and every bit of the acclaim thrown its way. Nowadays, it has fallen into the good graces of Max viewers.
Per FlixPatrol, Heretic has ascended to the top of the Max film charts in the United States at the time of writing, beating out its revolutionary animated competitor Flow (second place, although it’s probably too busy admiring its Oscar statue to care about this downgrade) and slop benchmark Morbius (seventh place).
Heretic stars Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East as a pair of Mormon missionaries who find themselves on the doorstep of one Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant), who purports to be interested in the faith and invites the girls in to talk religion. The discussion appears honest enough at first, but when chilling revelations turn into aggressive probing about faith, it becomes clear a little too late that the missionaries made a mistake by visiting this house.
Between Heretic, Blink, The Boogeyman, MaXXXine, and the horror-adjacent Companion, Sophie Thatcher has come to establish herself as a member of the 2020s-era scream queen designates alongside Mia Goth, Jenna Ortega, and Kathryn Newton. As Heretic‘s Sister Barnes, it’s easy to see why.
But it’s Hugh Grant’s presence as the insidious Mr. Reed that fascinates the most here; a statement backed up by his Golden Globe, Critics’ Choice, and BAFTA Award nominations for the performance. Grant, of Bridget Jones fame, enters this psychological horror territory by playing upon similar notes that defined his everpresence in the romantic comedy genre. In other words, Mr. Reed reads as the same haughty, slightly-to-entirely deplorable charmer that Grant’s face so often telegraphs.
It’s that exact familiarity, however, that makes the character’s evil impulses all the more unnerving. We reflexively want to find that rom-com-coded comfort in the actor, and that tempts us towards getting behind his cynically academic monologues on religion, all in spite of how obvious it is that Mr. Reed is bad news (this, importantly, is also downplayed until the other shoe is forced to drop, so to speak). We desperately want to trust him, and so it stings more when he crosses the lines that he does.
A24’s next pair of horror releases, Opus and Death of a Unicorn, will play more in the horror-comedy sphere than the straighter chills of Heretic. Early reviews haven’t been painting Opus in a particularly flattering light (it currently sits at a 39% approval rating after 33 reviews), while the jury cautiously remains out on Death of a Unicorn.
After that, however, will come more straight horror in Bring Her Back, the sophomore feature from the revelatory Philippou brothers of Talk To Me fame. So, even if Opus and Death of a Unicorn wind up falling short, we can at least look ahead to the work of some tried-and-true mavericks of the scare craft.
Published: Mar 10, 2025 11:52 am