"Mama" (2013)
"After a young couple take in their two nieces, they suspect that a supernatural spirit named Mama has latched onto their family."
(IMDB)
WHERE?
I watched it on HBO Max.
WHY?
I like horror movies: jump scares, gore, atmospheric terror, etc.
This movie also had a good trailer on Youtube.
You can check it out here.
INTRO?
During the 2008 financial crisis, US stockbroker Jeffrey Desange loses nearly all of his money and suffers a nervous breakdown.
He shoots and kills his work colleagues and goes home, where he murders his wife and flees with their two children -- 3 year-old Victoria who wears glasses and 1 year-old Lily.
While driving in the mountains, Jeffrey loses control of his car.
It slides down the road and falls off a cliff, plummeting into the woods below.
Thankfully, he and his daughters survive, but Victoria's glasses are now broken.
Bleeding and injured, Jeffrey takes his daughters deeper into the woods where they stumble upon an old abandoned cabin.
He takes them in and lets them wander around so he hide in a hall and cry.
His eldest daughter, Victoria, goes to a window and notices something outside.
She calls out for her father and tells him there's a woman outside -- but that her feet aren't touching the ground.
Jeffrey shows up, tells Victoria he loves her, then asks her to look out the window again.
With tears in his eyes, he raises the gun and points it at her.
Just as he's about to pull the trigger, Jeffrey is snatched up into the air by something in the dark.
He struggles for brief moment to break free but the thing in the dark snaps his neck.
Later at night, we see Victoria and Lily huddled by the cabin's lit fireplace.
Cold and hungry, they gaze into the flames.
It appears they will either freeze or starve to death.
A weird guttural sound rattles near them.
They turn to look at the source of the noise, staring into the shadows.
From out of the dark, cherries roll across the floor toward the girls.
THOUGHTS?
I think 2013's "Mama" is a modern fairy tale about loss that also asks the question: who or what is a mother/parent to a child.
Both girls, Victoria and Lily, are great characters who display two types of traumatized individuals -- one who remembers the world before trauma, and one who knows nothing but.
In 2013's "Mama," the trauma is two girls allegedly left alone to fend for themselves in the woods for 5 years.
I say allegedly because after being discovered the girls make references, while under psychological study, to a female figure who cared for them in the woods -- "Mama."
At first the adults in 2013's "Mama," go from questioning whether or not Mama exists -- at one point suspecting it to be an alternate personality of the older girl Victoria -- to quickly learning just how dangerous Mama's jealousy can be.
Other than the two girls, I think the true star of the movie -- since the titular Mama feels more like feral mythical beast -- is Jessica Chastain's character of Annabelle, Luke's girlfriend.
She is an example of the stereotypical modern woman -- a foul-mouthed, tattoo-sleeved, independent goth rocker chick questioning her commitment to her romantic partner, Jeffrey Desange's twin brother Luke.
And Luke is far from the ideal boyfriend: he is a struggling artist who's spent nearly all his money searching for his dead twin brother's daughters who've been missing for over 5 years.
And when Luke's nieces are recovered, the two girl are found to be severely traumatized and Chastain's Annabelle suddenly finds herself playing not just house but mother to children who aren't biologically or legally hers.
I felt like the movie used Annabelle to show the idea of the modern woman -- someone free from commitment, free from the traditional idea of the feminine, free to wander the world without being what is expected of a woman -- being kind, being nurturing, being a mama.
Sometimes it felt like there were two monsters in the movie, a jealous angry ghost and the sudden predicament of taking care of your boyfriend's two severely-traumatized nieces.
In the movie, there is immediately at first a distance between Annabelle and the girls, Victoria and Lily.
While recognizing her boyfriend Luke and at first even mistaking him for their deceased father, the two girls see Annabelle as a stranger who might have reason to refuse and reject them.
Just as there are two monsters for Annabelle, there are also two for Victoria and Lily:
(1) The angry jealous ghost that kept them alive in the woods for five years ...
And ...
(2) Being forced to question and possibly reconsider who or what a mama means to them due to Annabelle's sudden presence in their lives.
In the end, the movie tries to answer what makes someone ... or something a mama ?
Who survives?
Who do Victoria and Lily choose?
Parental Package # 1: Uncle Luke and Tattooed Goth Punk Mama?
Or ...
Parental Package # 2: Scary Floating Likes-To-Murder-People Mama?
If you'd like to find out the answers to these questions ...
You can, like me, use HBO Max
Or ...
Find some other way to watch 2013's "Mama" with that wonderful thing all us crypto people love -- the Internet.
I actually enjoyed this movie so here's the grade I'm giving it:
Hope you enjoyed this movie review!
Let me know what you think in the comments below!
Uuuff, that movie really got me back then... so scary ahaha
Yeah I remember it catching me off guard too back in the day. Even during my most recent watch I knew a jump scare was incoming and yet I still felt a bit of a jolt. I hate to admit the special effects felt slightly dated but the acting and story still held up since I first caught it in theaters. Can't believe 2013 was nine years ago haha time sure does blast by
Haha yes indeed! 9 years already??? Omg... time really flyes by!
Wow the movie sounds sad, tragic and scary all at the same time. I love the way you explain the plot.
Thanks
Thanks!