The Offering 2023

An old man conducts a ritual by slaughtering a chicken and hurriedly spreading ash in a circle. His sickly wife appears at the door and tells him to stop, to which he replies

Burn in hell

. He begins reading from a book and the letters start to bleed. Then a little girl whispers his name, Yossle, and asks him if he wants to see his wife again, to which he responds negatively. He steps outside the circle, swallowing a dark smoke as his sclera turns black. He then stabs himself with a knife from his back pocket. The demon struggles to remove the amulet around his neck, but the talisman won’t yield.

In Brooklyn, Arthur [Nick Blood] (Art) and his pregnant wife Claire travel to visit his father, Saul, who runs a Jewish funeral home in a Hasidic community. Art has an ulterior motive for the trip: he needs Saul to mortgage his house to save his faltering real estate business. The atmosphere is intimate and traditional, with neighbors and rituals coloring every corner of the mortuary’s world. Art offers to help with a new suicide body arriving for the family business, a process that drags him deeper into the family’s fragile web. The basement of Saul’s home doubles as the funeral home, a quiet, sealed space where death is both normal and unnerving.

Art encounters Heimish, a man who works with Saul and secretly cares for him. Heimish is protective but wary of Art’s true intentions and his presence unsettles the fragile balance in the household. As Saul and Heimish talk, Art prepares the body of Yosille, and a tragic accident occurs when the amulet around Yosille’s neck slips through a drain, releasing the demon that has haunted the old man’s prologue. The room fills with a cold, malevolent presence, and the once-ordinary mortuary suddenly feels like a threshold to something far darker.

Saul becomes suspicious when he finds Yosille’s knife, a weapon used in the man’s suicide, and seeks knowledge from Reb Chayim. The elder rabbi explains that the inscription, combined with an amulet, can be part of a binding ritual. However, since no amulet is present, Chayim dismisses the ritual’s significance, leaving Saul with uneasy questions and a sense that something has slipped beyond control.

Meanwhile, Art and Heimish go to collect another body—the missing girl Sarah Scheindel. Heimish grabs Art’s phone and uncovers Art’s money troubles and his plan to push Saul into signing off on the mortgage. When Claire confronts Art about the deception, he confesses a crisis of faith following his mother’s death, revealing a personal fragility that clashes with the family’s deep-rooted beliefs.

That night, the demon attacks in the mortuary and kills Saul. The next morning, Art awakens to find men praying around his father’s body, and Heimish blames Art for Saul’s “broken heart,” sharing the documents Art hoped Saul would sign. At the funeral, both Art and Claire experience disturbing visions—Claire sees Sarah Schneidel, while Art sleepwalks and draws a sigil on a carpet. He wakes to find himself on the carpet, half convinced he dreamt the whole night’s events.

Art struggles to close out his father’s affairs as Heimish has quit. He’s informed that Yosille requires a police clearance to be buried, unless a next-of-kin consents, despite it clearly being a suicide. He visits Yosille’s house and discovers a video tape that reveals Yosille’s true aim: to conjure the archangel Martiel to resurrect his dead wife Aida by using Sarah as a conduit. The ritual backfires, killing Sarah and summoning Abyzou instead.

Meanwhile, a figure claiming to be Aida visits Claire and declares a desire to see her husband’s body. If Claire tells Art that Aida is near, Art realizes his wife is in danger. While Claire is on the phone, Aida burns Yosille’s body, releasing Abyzou. Art races to save Claire but the demon’s influence is overwhelming.

Art turns to Heimish and shows him the crucial video. They recruit Reb Chayim again, who explains that Abyzou grows stronger when a child enters the sigil and that a binding ritual must trap the demon in a living body. Art is prepared to sacrifice himself for his wife and unborn child. Abyzou murders Chayim, forcing Art and Heimish to proceed with the ritual quickly.

The pair attempt to perform the binding, but Heimish is seized by Abyzou as Art begins the inscribed circle’s final steps. When he sees his wife’s silhouette being dragged toward a high window, he scurries outside the circle to rescue her, a move that undermines the ritual’s safety. Desperate, Art finishes the inscription to compel Abyzou to inhabit his own body, but he cannot bring himself to kill himself. Heimish drags him back toward the center, and Art begs Heimish to stab him with the inscribed knife. With hesitation, Heimish complies, confirming that Art should have stayed in the circle. The truth about the amulet’s absence dawns on Art as he realizes Heimish’s dead body lies nearby. In the final, harrowing moment, Art dies as the demon remains unbound, and Claire awakens under a table. She rushes to stop the demon masquerading as Art, only to discover Abyzou has taken her as well, pulling her into the sigil’s growing danger.