The 2008 financial collapse also affected, it seems, the spirit world. In Andrés Mushietti's interesting ghost story Mama, we begin just as an investment banker who has just lost everything in the collapse (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and has murdered his wife, takes his two young daughters Victoria (Megan Charpentier) and Lilly (Isabelle Nélisse) to an abandoned house deep in the woods of southern Virginia. He plans to kill the two girls (and probably himself too) but a powerful witch kills him first, and protects the two young girls. Finally, the investment banker’s brother Jeffrey (also played by Coster-Waldau) tracks the girls down, and decides to raise them with his bass playing girlfriend Annabel (Jessica Chastain), who at first doesn’t particularly care for the idea. Mama, however, comes with the girls, and will eliminate anyone who stands between her and “her” girls.
Mama is a skillfully made ghost story, if a fairly conventional one. The most effective choice made in the film is the decision to desaturize the color to a degree where sometimes it seems like we are viewing a black and white film. It lends the film an aura of deadness, which is the feeling that pervades through this film. Every thing in the film appears to be dead or dying. The color, or lack color, keeps a feeling of sadness and hopelessness running throughout the whole film. There is only bleakness and unhappiness. In addition, the movie, for the most part, is very quiet. It almost seems like there is nothing left alive in the film except whatever character is on the screen. This enhances the atmosphere tremendously, and only accentuates the feeling of death permeating the film.
Mama herself (Javier Botet) is an interesting character. She looks terrifying, and possesses all the expected powers of a vengeful ghost. However, she has a sad and tragic history that can help one, if not approve of her actions, at least understand them. However, the most interesting idea in the film is the idea of two young girls who are raised almost feral children. Victoria and Lilly, when their uncle finally finds them, behave almost as animals. The film shows them slowly breaking down their defenses in a very believable manner. If the idea of feral children suddenly thrust back into modern life were explored a bit more deeply, I believe it would've been a more interesting film. Nevertheless, the two young actresses do a wonderful job playing the two feral girls.
"Make sure to brush your teeth before you go to bed girls!"
Most of the rest of the cast is very solid as well. Jessica Chastain is very good at Annabel, a young woman who plays bass in a rock band, and really does not want to be raising two little girls. Early on, she does a marvelous job of seeming to just "go through the motions" of taking care of the kids. She often seems more like a bored babysitter then a new parent. When she learns to love the two girls, her performance becomes a bit more conventional, but it is still very good. Coster-Waldau is also good as Jeffrey. He seems truly concerned about his young nieces, and he also does a very good job of seeming clueless of anything going on around him. The only real disappointing performance is that of Daniel Kash as Dr. Dreyfuss, a therapist who try to help Annabel and Jeffrey with the girls. It is hard to tell if it is the way to character is written, or if it is Kash's performance, but too often he seems like nothing more than a scheming bad guy rather than a therapist whose motivations are conflicted.
So we have here a film that is well-made, and mostly very well performed. Nevertheless, it is far from a perfect film. The characters in it constantly are forced into doing "horror movie dumb" things. Far too often, characters are doing things by themselves when they should have someone with them, or they are exploring dark forests or abandoned buildings in the middle of the night. It seems that a more clever script could get the characters the information they need without making them look like idiots.
The biggest problem with this film is that it is not terribly frightening. It has some good jump scares, and Mama is a fairly frightening character. However, all the expected "ghost stories" elements are here. There does not seem to be that much that is fresh. The one fresh idea, that of feral children being raised by a ghost, does not last very long into the film. Before long, the storyline moves towards a standard plot of a mother (or in this case a prospective aunt) taking care of her helpless daughters. SPOILER ALERT: at the end of the film, a nice nuclear family has been established, with Annabel, Jeffrey and Victoria together, while the spirit of Lilly moves onto the next world in the form of a moth. For a film that is supposed to be terrifying, it is much too happy an ending.
The family united.
Overall, Mama is a good but not great horror film that is entertaining but not particularly memorable. Perhaps it's PG-13 rating prevents it from going as far as it needs to to become a truly terrifying movie. It is a quality ghost story, but it does not stand on the same level with a movie such as The Blair Witch Project or the original The Haunting.
Eric Miller
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