Review: 'Heretic' finds fright in the dialogue, setting a dangerous game between Latter-day Saint missionaries and a terrifying Hugh Grant

There are many dangers in horror movies, but the psychological terror of “Heretic” serves up something novel — and I don’t say this in a bad way — by showing a sociopath who’s trying to talk his victims to death.

Two young women, missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, are walking their bicycles through a Colorado ski town, trying without success to start conversations about their faith with anyone who passes by. Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) is the more senior of the two, it seems, while Sister Paxton (Chloe East), is the new arrival. This ranking is never stated, but the script by co-directors Scott Beck and Bryan Woods suggests it strongly.

Paxton and Barnes have an address for a likely prospect, so they lock up their bicycles and ring the doorbell as the rain is starting to turn to snow. A man, Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant), answers, and says he’s interested in learning what the missionaries have to say about the Latter-day Saint faith. The missionaries hesitate, citing the rule that they can’t enter a man’s home if a woman isn’t also present. Mr. Reed assures them that his wife is inside, making a blueberry pie.

Once inside, the missionaries begin their well-rehearsed message — what members call “the first discussion” — but Mr. Reed already seems to know a lot more about the Latter-day Saint faith than he was letting on. He even pulls out a large leather-bound volume of the Book of Mormon, with plenty of Post-It notes sticking out from the pages. Paxton and Barnes start thinking they’ve got a good prospect for baptism.

But there’s something off about Mr. Reed, some level of insincerity that the missionaries pick up on. And where’s that wife of his with the blueberry pie?

It doesn’t take long Paxton and Barnes to realize they’re in danger — in fact, in movie terms, they’re pretty sharp on the uptake. But still, they don’t realize their problem until it’s too late, and Mr. Reed is drawing them further inside his labyrinthine house, and into a lesson about Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and what he says he has learned is “the one true religion.”

Beck and Woods, who wrote the nearly wordless “A Quiet Place,” here go the opposite direction, building up tension mostly through dialogue. It’s a smart screenplay, that uses allusions to Monopoly and Radiohead’s “Creep” to make Mr. Reed’s points about comparative religion and gives Paxton and Barnes the grit and intelligence to challenge him — and East (“The Fabelmans”) and Thatcher (“Yellowjackets”) give those characters the courage and grit they need if they want to escape with their lives.

What gives “Heretic” its menace, though, is Hugh Grant, who’s clearly reveling in the villain phase of his career. (See “Paddington 2” and “Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves” as other examples.) As Mr. Reed, Grant deploys the shambling charms of his “Notting Hill”/“Four Weddings and a Funeral” days, then twists our expectations into something devilish. It’s a captivating performance, one that lifts “Heretic” to the heights of unbearable tension.

——

‘Heretic’

★★★1/2

Opens Friday, November 8, in theaters everywhere. Rated R for some bloody violence. Running time: 110 minutes.