Hugh Grant-Starring Horror Movie Heretic Gets First Trailer From A24

A24 has recruited romantic comedy icon Hugh Grant to play a sweater-vest wearing “nice guy” in their next movie — but it isn’t quite what it sounds like. In the new trailer for The Heretic, audiences can get a first look at Grant playing a man who traps a pair of young missionaries in his house of horrors. The women, who are going door to door trying to convert people, figure out too late that Grant’s character is lying to them, and when they try to leave, they realize that he has the whole house rigged. Eventually, he offers the pair two doors, and lets them choose which way they want to try and escape the house.

Grant, best known for his work in the 1990s, has recently taken a turn toward franchise entertainment. He starred in Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves and Wonka last year, drawing praise for both films, in which he played against type.

“I got a bit better,” Grant said last year, explaining why he got out of romantic comedies. “I got a little less bad after I had children, got married, got happier….I got too old and fat and ugly to do romantic comedies, obviously, so I got off with more interesting things.”  

You can see the trailer below.

Of course, he is returning to one of his most famous roles next year with Peacock and Universal’s Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, which brings back Renee Zelweger in the title role and reunites her with Grant for the first time since 2004’s Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason.

Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, who wrote and directed the movie, wrote John Krasinski’s 2018 A Quiet Place. After that movie blew up, they wrote and directed 2019’s Haunt, the Adam Driver movie 65, and the Stephen King adaptation The Boogeyman, which starred Thatcher.

Per the official synopsis for The Heretic, “Two young missionaries are forced to prove their faith when they knock on the wrong door and are greeted by a diabolical Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant), becoming ensnared in his deadly game of cat-and-mouse.”

Written and directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, the film stars Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, and Chloe East. Heretic will be in theaters on