Disturbing Hereditary Trailer Sends A Mother’s Day Message That’s All Kinds Of Messed Up

This Sunday is Mother's Day, and for many families that means children spending the day with their mom to celebrate the holiday. Perhaps that involves taking mom out to eat, doing some outdoor activity, or going to the movies - seeing something like Avengers: Infinity War, Breaking In, or Life of the Party. Unfortunately one movie that's not out yet is the new horror film Hereditary - but that's not stopping it from marking the occasion. The film is all about family, so it decided to send a special message to all the moms out there on this holiday. Just know that it's not exactly safe for work!

Well, that is sufficiently nightmarish. Nothing says Mother's Day like cutting the head off a dead bird and admitting how intensely creepy children can be. Seemingly taking a page out of Deadpool's book, this video sells the movie as something else, complete with frilly text and warm, upbeat piano music for about 10 seconds before taking a jarring and disturbing turn. I can definitely imagine someone who knew nothing about this movie ahead of time being thrown for a loop watching this. The ending to this trailer is also brilliant. I love that it goes from scary back to the innocent and flowery tone it began with just as Toni Collette's character admits something most parents would never dare utter aloud: that she didn't want to be a parent. This is oddly hilarious in its honesty, and practically gives you whiplash from the tonal shift. Seriously great stuff.

What works so well about this is that it isn't just any horror movie bending the marketing to fit the Mother's Day holiday; Hereditary is actually perfectly suited to a day about family and mothers and their children. As you can probably tell from this trailer, though, Hereditary deals with a family going through some serious stuff. The feature film debut of writer/director Ari Aster tells the story of the Graham clan, who, following the death of a grandmother, begin to discover frightening secrets about their ancestry as a terror takes over their household. The early reactions to this film out of the festival circuit tease a film that is genuinely terrifying and a brilliant new chapter in the ongoing horror renaissance.

Hereditary is one of those under-the-radar summer movies that are worth paying attention to, so hopefully this kind of fun marketing brings some more attention to it. The film stars Toni Collette, Gabriel Byrne, Alex Wolff and Milly Shapiro. Hereditary looks to pic up on the wonderfully horrific trend where A Quiet Place left off when it releases in theaters on June 8th. Check out everything else hitting theaters this year in our 2018 release guide. For all the latest movie news and why there's nothing more terrifying than family, stay tuned to CinemaBlend.

Nick Evans

Nick grew up in Maryland has degrees in Film Studies and Communications. His life goal is to walk the earth, meet people and get into adventures. He’s also still looking for The Adventures of Pete and Pete season 3 on DVD if anyone has a lead.