Bloody Perfect: Heads Will Roll
Isaura Barbé-Brown brings us the next post in her new monthly column, Bloody Perfect.
I had many questions the first time I watched Hereditary (2018): What the hell was that? What the fuck just happened? Does anyone know Toni Collette’s current location and is it on my bedroom ceiling?
I remember leaving the cinema, after this film, a specific type of scared. The kind of scared you talk to your therapist about. On the dark walk home, I flinched at shadows and was truly worried that I’d look over my shoulder, and there Toni Collette would be, waiting to pounce.
There are so many scenes in Hereditary that are instantly iconic, it was honestly hard to choose just one; Gabriel Byrne bursting into flame? Toni sawing her own head off? The sensational ‘mother’ monologue? Or the now infamous decapitation scene…?
But when I really thought about it, there is one scene I truly will never shut up about and it immediately follows one of the most shocking deaths in recent cinema history.
Peter (Alex Wolff) is cajoled into taking his odd little sister Charlie (Milly Shapiro) to a party. Once there, Peter is more in interested in getting high with the girl he likes and leaves Charlie to fend for herself, suggesting she get a slice of chocolate cake, which would be fine if it wasn’t laced with walnuts and Charlie didn’t have a deadly nut allergy. Already at the beginning of anaphylaxis, she finds her brother, who tries to rush her to hospital. Charlie, desperate for air, hangs her head out the window of the car, as Peter, speeding, swerves to avoid a dead dear in the road accidently lining Charlie’s head up with a pylon. Before anyone knows what’s happening, Charlie’s head is on the ground.
But then the chaos quiets.
Peter stops the car. He glances at the rear-view mirror but doesn’t fully look, because to look at Charlie’s decapitated body would be to acknowledge the reality of what just happened. Instead, he sits, then starts the car and slowly drives home. He enters the house, climbs the stairs, gets into bed and lies awake until morning arrives. He listens to his parents get up and talk and his mother leave for the day, and then he hears the blood curdling scream of a mother finding the headless body of her youngest child in the back of her car.
Initially my question was, why would he do that?? It seems counter intuitive, but then honestly, what the hell wouldyou do? Do you pick up the head? Do you continue to hospital? Call the police? Your parents? Peter is, understandably, in complete shock. His little sister is not just dead, HER HEAD IS SEPREATED FROM HER BODY. He is running on basic motor functions. The only thing that makes sense is to go home, go to bed, pretend it never happened, and maybe, just maybe, it won’t have.
Peter’s reaction is somehow relatable. His face as he sits in the car or as he lies in bed is never far from my mind. We don’t see the immediate aftermath, but we can imagine him going downstairs, finally having to confront the body, explain to his broken parents – with actual words – somehow, what has happened. It feels impossible. There is no right thing to do but go back in time.
I have many questions for director Ari Aster, but what I would do if I was responsible for my sibling’s horrifying demise, is not one of them. He’s answered it with Peter’s perfect reaction. Why this film has given me an irrational fear of Toni Collette will have to be answered another time.
Isaura Barbé-Brown is a Hackney born and based actress. She studied at AADA in New York and BADA in Oxford. She has written for The BFI, Black Ballad UK as well as The Final Girls/Bloody Women and been a guest on The Final Girls podcast and the Evolution of Horror podcast. She has done talks at the BFI for their Squad Goals event and during their Love season with the Bechdel Test Fest on race in romantic films. Isaura has also been on panels for BFI Future Film, The Watersprite Film Festival and The Norwich Film Festival. Her acting work covers theatre, film, tv and voiceover. She has also written for short film, TV and theatre as well as short stories and poetry. You can find Isaura on Twitter and Instagram.
We've been going independently for years now, and so far have self-financed every single project. In order to do more work, and continue supporting amazing filmmakers in the genre space, we've launched a Patreon.
If you are able to support us and the work we do on Patreon, we'd truly and deeply appreciate it.