All families have secrets. Some are just far more sinister than others. Ari Aster's excellent and acclaimed horror movie Hereditary is now streaming on Netflix. Added on January 15, it quickly catapulted into the streamer's top 10, debuting in the sixth spot.
Often considered one of the first significant movies to put independent production company A24 on the map with audiences in a big way, Hereditary has also been declared one of the scariest movies of all time by countless fans, several prominent publications, and science itself (sort of)!
In 2022, Broadband Choices conducted a study on 250 people to see which horror movies got their heart rates up the most, using that as an indicator to rank the scariest movies ever. It's not a foolproof scientific method or anything like that, but it's still a fun way to get a semi-objective look at which films freak people out the most. According to that study, Hereditary is the fifth scariest horror movie, at least out of the ones featured in the experiment. It's the only A24 film on the list.
Sketchy studies aside, Hereditary frequently crops up in conversations about the most frightening horror films. A quick Google search on the topic brings up numerous Reddit threads, articles, and lists—all pointing to the Toni Collette-starring film as a truly harrowing piece of filmmaking.
Last year, Rotten Tomatoes published an editorial piece about the scariest films and Hereditary came in second place, just under The Exorcist, which is also largely considered an all-time classic that still holds up with its scares decades later.
At its heart, Hereditary is a family drama. It just also happens to be the stuff of nightmares. The film features an Oscar-worthy performance from Collette, who plays Annie, mother of two teenage children, who begins digging into her family lineage after the death of her highly secretive mother.
A significant reason Hereditary is so terrifying is due to Aster employing several abrupt and sometimes brutal twists. It's a difficult movie to predict, which can make viewers feel even more anxious than they would during a more conventional scary movie. Most frequent horror movie watchers can sense when the next jump scare is coming or know what to expect from a kill scene, Hereditary excels at keeping you unsettled from scene to scene.