Witches, Artists, and Pandemonium in Hereditary

Still from Hereditary.

I had been sitting in a lovesick fog, waiting to see Ari Aster’s Hereditary, ever since I first heard about it. I don’t usually follow new movie releases too closely, but I found out about the movie back in January, when people at the Sundance Film Festival lost their minds about how good it was. As soon as I saw the words The Exorcist and The Shining attached to the film’s publicity materials, I knew I had to see it.

I spent six agonizing months memorizing its trailers, watching YouTube fan movies (and considering making my own), talking to my friends about it until they began rolling their eyes,