Directed by Andres Muschietti
Starring Jessica Chastain, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Megan Charpentier, Isabelle Nelisse, Daniel Kash
RATING
7/10
Guillermo Del Toro seemingly treats his filmography like a wild game of poker. He chooses some risky projects to produce, and almost always hits the mark. However, with his hand far into the horror genre, Del Toro is a mastercraftsman of his work in the field. He knows how to scare us, even when he unintentionally doesn't. So his picks of horror films aren't a gamble, but after the middling results of "Don't Be Afraid of the Dark", many suspected that this master may be reaching his end in the genre. Fortunately, Del Toro came back with middle fingers flying in the form of "Mama". "Mama" came out at a very fragile time in cinema, and by that I mean a February release date. There's a lot of risk of failure, and especially for horrors. So this wasn't exactly the film to look out for. However, I will say I am pleasantly surprised.
"Mama" tells the story of a couple of children who are found five years later in a cabin in the woods after their disappearance with their father. They are taken in only to discover that they have developed animalistic qualities and cannot seem to stop talking about "mama". Once they are taken in by their caring uncle and punk-rocker aunt, they begin to receive frequent visits from a powerful spirit who seeks to rip them away from the family.
"Mama" is definitely one of the better modern horror films. Even though it was directed by a different person, this has Del Toro's fingerprints all over it. There are moments of sheer terror that are quickly balanced with moments of sheer beauty and awe, and walks a fine line between being a fantasy and being a horror. Jessica Chastain does a great job as a very unorthodox female lead, being a punk. Might I add, that just makes her insanely sexier too... But that's just my preference. Her chemistry with the two girls is shoddy at first, but as the intensity amplifies, Chastain's character, Annabel, has to switch to mother mode, for which she does greatly. However, there are a few characters that never quite give much importance to the story, other than to basically die or go into a deep coma (looking at you, Game of Thrones guy). So Chastain has to carry the entire second half of the film, and thanks to her charisma, she nails it. Make no mistake, even though I said this has plenty of typical Del Toro fantasy elements, there's still an abundance of scares to sink your teeth into, and they are orchestrated very well. There is a very old school aesthetic to the scares here, relying on plenty of jump scares that actually have a scare behind them. The antagonistic force, Mama, is never revealed for a good portion of the film, and that's a nice throwback to the suspense masters of the past like Hitchcock, Spielberg, and (once upon a time) M. Night Shyamalan. The films strength ultimately lies in how well it hides its villain and how great of an impact she makes whenever we have a glimpse of her. It's a great balancing act. Though, the film also faulters on a few simple but offkey beats. As mentioned, there's not much room for side characters to grow, and once we actually do see Mama, the scary effect of her is worn off a bit and it becomes rather overbloated with visual effects. A great horror villain should still maintain its scary image well after they're revealed, but Mama falls a bit short of the mark.
"Mama" is an entertaining and very scary film that does nothing new to the horror genre, but thanks to its well-crafted scare sequences, a solid performance from Jessica Chastain, and a good grasp on intensity and suspense, it proves to be well worth your time if you're an old school horror fan hoping for basic and effective scares rather than over-the-top gore.
