Hugh Grant's Brilliant 2024 Horror Movie Is Taking Over Max's Top Charts

It may be hard for folks who weren't around at the time to understand, but there was a moment when Hugh Grant appeared poised to become one of the biggest movie stars on the planet.

Flashback to the spring of 1994. Bill Clinton was a popular U.S. President, everyone was drinking Zima, and moviegoers were flocking to cineplexes to see the British rom-com "Four Weddings and a Funeral." It was a surprise hit that picked up word-of-mouth steam via a slow roll-out from its distributor Gramercy Pictures, which was fortunate to have a great, immensely appealing film at a time when theaters were being inundated with dreck like "Major League II," "Cops and Robbersons" and "D2: The Mighty Ducks."

While "Four Weddings and a Funeral" is at heart an ensemble comedy, Grant's endearingly flappable demeanor and effortless delivery of the film's hilariously quippy dialogue had some critics comparing him to Hollywood's greatest Grant. (Cary, not Lou.) 20th Century Fox took note, and immediately cast him in the Chris Columbus-directed rom-com "Nine Months," which performed well at the box office despite getting released in the wake of the star's highly publicized arrest for procuring the services of a sex worker in a public space. He'd survived this career-endangering controversy and seemed back on the superstar track. Obviously, Grant did quite well over the next decade, but he never caught fire the way the industry thought he would.

Now 64 years old and unburdened by lofty movie star expectations, Grant's having a blast taking on all kinds of parts in wildly different sorts of films. He was a hilariously hissable villain in "Paddington 2" (a very polite takedown of British colonialism and xenophobia), an arms dealer in the loopy "Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre," and a sarcastic Oompa-Loompa in "Wonka." But his best performance of recent vintage came last year in a horror flick that currently sits atop Max's streaming movies chart.

Written and directed by the filmmaking duo of Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, the critically acclaimed "Heretic" did solid business in theaters last year (earning just over $58 million worldwide on a budget of $10 million), but it seems to be even more popular now that it's available to stream. According to FlixPatrol, "Heretic" is currently the most popular movie on Max, edging out recent Academy Award-winner "Flow," "Assassin's Creed," and "Elevation."

The film's got a nifty hook: while going door-to-door attempting to convert regular folks to Mormonism, two young missionaries (Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East) find themselves invited into the home of an initially welcoming gentleman (Grant) who rather quickly turns out to be a deeply unfriendly fellow. He's trapped the girls in his house, and intends to put their beliefs, and lives, on the line in inventively nefarious ways.

Thatcher and East are both very much up to the task of challenging Grant, but the veteran actor, bolstered by a strong script, can't help but dominate the film. It's a smart, genuinely unnerving horror movie that lingers in memory longer than you might expect. So, if you're looking to get creeped out in the comfort of your own home, you really should give "Heretic" a shot.