From It Follows to Hereditary: How one indie curse flick opened the gates to modern elevated horror.
Yesterday I was talking about actors and Hereditary, and it got me thinking: does Ari Aster even happen without It Follows?
Just hear me out.
When you look at the modern wave of what critics like to call “elevated horror,” it feels like It Follows was the spark that set the whole thing ablaze. I’m not taking anything away from Ari Aster, the guy poured blood, sweat, and trauma into his movies, and he’s clearly one of the strongest auteurs working today. But it’s worth asking whether Aster, or even The Witch (and by extension A24’s horror dominance), get the same momentum without the success of It Follows in 2014.
It Follows : The Spark That Lit the Fuse
When It Follows dropped, it wasn’t just another indie horror movie, it was an art film wearing a monster mask. David Robert Mitchell wrapped a simple curse story in haunting cinematography, synth music, and dread heavy pacing that screamed John Carpenter through a Terrence Malick lens.
Critics loved it. Casual audiences didn’t just watch it; they talked about it. Suddenly, horror wasn’t just a niche again, it was borderline respectable. It Follows bridged that gap between festival buzz and midnight movie fun. It proved you could make something artful, slow, and personal and still fill seats.
That matters, because up until that point, most horror that hit wide release seemed like it was jump scare city ; The Conjuring, Insidious, Sinister, and their dozens of imitators. It Follows didn’t reject that crowd; it just evolved it.
The Foundation Before the Fuse: Wingard, West, and the Indie Boom
While It Follows might’ve been the catalyst, the groundwork was already being laid by filmmakers like Adam Wingard and Ti West.
West’s The House of the Devil (2009) and The Innkeepers (2011) brought back that slow-burn tension and old school filmmaking patience, proving indie horror could be deliberate, stylish, and atmospheric. Meanwhile, Adam Wingard’s You’re Next (2011) took the home invasion genre and twisted it into something both meta and crowd-pleasing.
And while I don’t have proof, I’ve got a strong uneducated hunch that the *worldwide success of You’re Next made studios like A24 start turning their gaze toward horror in the indie space. Up until then, A24 had been focused mostly on quirky or prestige indie dramas. But horror? That was an untapped frontier with the same artistic freedom and bigger box office potential.
So yeah, It Follows may have lit the match, but Wingard and West stacked the kindling.
The VVitch : The Door Opens Wider
A year later, A24 released The Witch (2015), and that movie felt like the next logical step.
Same arthouse sensibility. Same patient dread. Same sense of cosmic punishment wrapped in religious guilt.
Would A24 have been so confident backing something that strange, quiet, and dialect heavy without It Follows proving audiences would show up for “serious” horror? Hard to say, but It Follows made the idea less risky. It showed that audiences were ready for slow burn horror that rewarded attention instead of jump scares.
And when The Witch became a cultural flashpoint, with critics calling it “the scariest movie in years” and mainstream audiences walking out confused, A24 realized they’d found their voice. Horror didn’t have to cater. It could challenge.
Hereditary: The Crown Jewel
Then, in 2018, Hereditary hit and suddenly, “elevated horror” was the label of the decade.
Ari Aster’s debut didn’t just continue what It Follows and The Witch started, it refined it.
The grief. The trauma. The family unraveling under invisible pressure. All those themes that horror fans had seen hinted at in earlier films were now turned into emotional nuclear fallout.
And the success of Hereditary (and later Midsommar) wasn’t just a win for Aster, it cemented A24’s reputation as the house that made horror matter again. But the first whisper of that shift? That came from It Follows.
So, Does Ari Aster Exist Without It Follows?
Sure. The guy’s talent is undeniable, and his short films already showed his voice years before It Follows came out. But his moment, the cultural space that allowed Hereditary to thrive, doesn’t happen in the same way without It Follows setting the tone and The Witch solidifying it.
It Follows made people believe horror could be cinematic again. The Witch proved that audiences would buy into that idea. And Hereditary turned that momentum into a movement.
So maybe Ari Aster doesn’t owe It Follows his career, but modern horror might owe it its identity.