Hereditary premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2018 to rave reviews, a near-perfect Rotten Tomatoes score and the declaration that it was the “scariest horror movie in years”.

Don’t believe me? Stylist.co.uk editor Kayleigh Dray went to see it and was so terrified that she went into a dissociative state. “I didn’t even realise that I was crying until I reached up and touched my wet face,” she wrote at the time.

The movie had all the elements of a truly unsettling thriller. It had a creepy child, an even creepier mother and one truly unsettling doll house. “Hereditary is so disquieting, you’ll be gasping for air in the theatre,” one critic wrote. “Utterly believable supernatural horror. There will be no scarier movie this year.”

I’m going to take their (and Kayleigh’s) words for it, because I have not seen Hereditary and will spend the rest of my existence on this here Earth avoiding seeing Hereditary. I was terrified simply reading the Wikipedia plot description of the movie. Just imagine what I would be like in the cinema.

Another movie I won’t be seeing? Midsommar, the new project from Hereditary’s director Ari Aster. The movie is slated for release later this year and promises to be yet another terrifying horror story to scream at. Here’s everything we know about the film: 

What is the plot of Midsommar?

Aster is keeping plot details of Midsommar under tight wraps, just as he did with Hereditary. It makes sense – horror movies work best when absolutely no information is readily available to viewers before they step into the cinema. All the better to shock you with.

This is what we do know about Midsommar: it’s Scandinavian. Set in a rural town in Sweden, it will follow a couple visiting their friends for the famous Swedish midsummer festival, only to to have their lives upended by a local pagan cult. Don’t you hate it when that happens? 

In a reddit interview, Aster revealed that there is a “generous amount of psychedelia” in Midsommar. “I’m going to remain pretty cryptic here, but I’ll say that [Midsommar] is a break-up movie that devolves into something much more sinister. This one, however, has no ties to the supernatural.”

Will it be as terrifying as Hereditary? Aster says yes, describing it as “Scandinavian folk horror”. It’s also the last scary movie that he is going to make for the near future. 

“That is the only horror movie I have,” Aster told The Hollywood Reporter. “And I’m pretty sure that’s going to be it for a long time. I love the genre, I consider myself a genre filmmaker in that I want to play in every genre. I would love to make a musical.” 

Who is in the cast of Midsommar?

A lot of very good actors.

Midsommar will star The Little Drummer Girl’s Florence Pugh, one of the most exciting young British stars of the moment, in the main role. It’ll be just one of many big releases of 2019 for Pugh, who also features in Fighting with my Family and Greta Gerwig’s Little Women as the pugnacious youngest sister Amy.

Pugh knew she wanted to star in Midsommar the second she read Aster’s script, and told him as much when they had their first meeting. “Usually when you do those Skype [meetings], you beat around the bush, but we were both so tired, we were like ‘I’m yours’,” Pugh told the Guardian. “We both got told off by our reps for doing that, but it was one of those amazing moments.” 

Pugh will be joined in the lead role by Jack Reynor of Sing Street and On The Basis Of Sex. Rounding out the cast are Will Poulter, Vilhelm Blomgren, William Jackson Harper and Ellora Torchia. 

Is it called Sommar or Midsommar?

Good question. For a long time, Aster has been calling the movie Midsommar. 

But in the first teaser released by film studio A24 the movie is referred to as Sommar. We demand to know the truth! And yet, it is denied us. It should all become clear very soon. 

Is there a trailer for Midsommar?

The first full-length trailer for Midsommar has been released, and it’s even more disturbing than the teaser.

It opens with Dani and Christian on the verge of breaking up, until Dani experiences a family tragedy (which, interestingly,  we have no details about at this point…). She instead joins Christian and his friends – who don’t appear to be her biggest fans – on the trip to Sweden, where the weirdness starts to unravel.  It quickly teases the impending horror with clips of levitation, animal sacrifices, what looks to be a hallucinogenic trip and a creepy old man who tells Dani that she can’t leave. What makes watching this series of events even more uncomfortable is the dreamlike aesthetic and  discordant music swelling in the background. Argh! 

Take a look at the new full length Midsommar trailer below

What is the release date of Midsommar?

Midsommar will be released in cinemas in the US and the UK on 9 August.

Images: A24, Getty