Ari Aster's follow-up to 'Hereditary' hits Irish cinemas on July 5th.
If you didn't yet get a chance to watch 'Hereditary', rectify that as soon as possible because it's one of the best horrors in recent memory.
Considering that was director Ari Aster's debut, you'd imagine there'd be a whiff of a "difficult second album" from 'Midsommar'. Thankfully, that's not the case if these early reviews by US outlets are anything to go by.
Our own Jack Reynor stars as one half of a troubled relationship with Florence Pugh. After her character suffers a personal tragedy, the couple decide to go on a trip to rural Sweden with their two friends, Will Poulter and 'The Good Place' alum William Jackson Harper. Whilst there, they encounter a village that's in the middle of a folk festival that takes place every 90 years, which the villagers insist they take part in.
At first, it all seems a little quaint and strange, but before long, things take a weird and disturbing turn in no time. Again, if you ever saw 'Hereditary', you'd know that that's really putting it in mild terms.
Here's some of the Twitter reactions from the first screening in the US.
Three-word #Midsommar review: What the fuck...
— @alishagrauso.bsky.social (@AlishaGrauso) June 19, 2019
MIDSOMMAR: Psychologically fragile tourists meet a full blast of Swedish folk horror, mounted by Ari Aster at the peak of his atmospheric powers. No director in horror is working at his level of choreography, the daring of his alienating moments. What a weird spell this is.
— Joshua Rothkopf (@joshrothkopf) June 19, 2019
If HEREDITARY is about the dark family skeletons hidden away in the shadows, MIDSOMMAR is about the skeletons we proudly hang on the wall. Their visual styles reflect this.
— Jacob Hall (@JacobSHall) June 19, 2019
MIDSOMMAR didn't shake me quite as much as HEREDITARY did, but it's a much different film, more interested in enveloping the audience in the seductively banal horror of ritual—in making madness look like wisdom, in the wrong (broad day)light. More...tomorrow, probably.
— A.A. Dowd (@AADowd) June 19, 2019