Josh Keown | Night Terror Novels 🧛🏻♂️’s review published on Letterboxd:
“A ghost is an emotion bent out of shape, condemned to repeat itself time and time again.”
-Dr. Dreyfuss’ Secretary (Elva Mai Hoover)
Being such a massive fan of the horror genre, I’d wager years and years of subtle erosion has slowly but surely desensitised me to most instances of the genre on-screen; they certainly don’t have as much effect as they once did. However, one film that does have the ability to unsettle me, no matter how many times I watch it, is the original short upon which this film based, also titled ‘Mama’. I think in some ways, short horror films can be more effective than their feature-length cousins, if only because it is far more challenging to sustain terror for a couple of hours or so than it is for just a couple of minutes. This is very much the case for Mama, and the recent 100 minute version it has inspired.
The feature-length rendition of Mama is not a bad film by any means, but neither is it all that original. However originality is a difficult thing to come by nowadays, and director Muschietti (who is also responsible for the 2008 short) takes a fairly routine plot and pulls it off effectively. What surprised me, though, was the solid emotional story at the heart of Mama; such of the ilk that is so rarely seen in the genre. It’s very obviously borne from executive producer Del Toro’s involvement, resulting in a conclusion comparable to the intimate finale of Pan’s Labyrinth or The Devil’s Backbone. It’s definitely helped by some fantastic performances from the cast, too. Chastain is predictably wonderful, even if she is punked out to the point of being almost unrecognisable. Coster-Waldau is a bit underused, but the two child actors are excellently cast and do brilliantly with the mature roles.
The actual design and CGI for the Mama character is really good, and this is coming from someone who usually vilifies special effects over practical ones. Here, though, helped by Spanish monster-dude Javier Botet (best known as Niña Medeiros in the [REC] franchise), Mama is genuinely terrifying. That being said, I do believe they featured her far too much toward the end, which severely hampered the creepiness.
VERDICT; A good little horror film, albeit one marred by some flaws and a lack of originality. Like Sinister last year, Mama doesn’t reinvent the genre but instead takes a tried and tested formula and attempts to perfect it, and to some degree, it works effectively well. It loses its focus a little toward the end, and is slightly too clichéd, but as it is Mama provides ample entertainment for the duration of its runtime.
3.5/5 or 7/10