You are probably wondering what to
expect from Student Speak. Well, here is a little preview of what sort of
content you will find in our snazzy new mag.
Written by one of our hard-working copywriters,
Grace Montgomery, this is a short and snappy review of Mama, the creepy new
horror film currently showing at cinemas all over town.
Give it a read and let us know what
you think. Oh, and by the way – it contains spoilers!
I
went into Mama with little expectations, because normally those sort of
supernatural thrillers aren’t my bag; I like my horror films a bit more
realistic or gory. For me, it wasn’t the spooky presence, the haunting spirit
that intrigued me. No, it was the unique storyline that caught my attention.
Two little children disappearing into the woods, left to fend for themselves,
forced to grow up in a sinister, desolate cabin? Creepy, scary, imaginative, I
liked it.
The
plot, in a nutshell, is that two little girls, Victoria (Megan Charpentier) and
Lily (Isabelle Nélisse), are left stranded in the woods after their father
kills their mother, and when they are found several years later they are
extremely feral and animal-like. A child psychiatrist decides that the girls’
uncle, Lucas (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and his punk rock girlfriend Annabel
(Jessica Chastain) should take care of the kids, so they move into a new home,
ready to begin a new life. But it soon comes to light that along with the
children, something else has moved in...
For
me, the scariest aspect was not, as you would expect, ‘mama’. It was in fact
the girls. How they moved about when they were first discovered in the
cabin, after living on a diet of cherries and moths, was chilling. It makes you
think about the possibilities of what a child would be like if it were
left to fend for itself in the wild. Freakishly walking on all fours,
scampering around and perching on top of a fridge, staring coldly and
defensively, the scene when they were found was for me, the scariest part of
the film. (Like I said before, ghosts and ghouls don’t do it for me. But
obviously that’s just my preference.)
Produced
by Guillermo del Toro, the film does explore what I thought was an interesting
angle- the children adapting to the real world after having been deprived of it
for so many years. This was a creative idea, and quite unusual for horror films
to look at such a social aspect. If only this was touched upon a bit more, it
would have been even creepier.
Taking
a different spin on the usual ‘child haunted by a presence’ by bringing in a
maternal link, (which meant the children initially wanted to be with
mama rather than being scared of her) was different and interesting. It was
also good to watch Annabel begin to connect with the kids, although it was
reasonably obvious from the start that her disdain towards looking after them
would soon turn to affection.
Unfortunately,
the film does delve into the clichés you tend to get with these supernatural
thrillers. The spirit ‘mama’ belongs to a mental asylum patient who was
separated from her child in the 1800s, who went on to commit suicide, then
seeking Victoria and Lily as her substitute children. And as for venturing into
the dark forest to the abandoned cabin on your own, Mr Psychiatrist, well, you
were asking for it really, weren’t you?
With
a fairly predictable ending (Lily choosing to stay with ‘Mama’ rather than
Annabel, Lucas and Victoria), combined with the aggrieved mother who is a
mental patient escapee, the film did lack a bit of originality at times.
However,
despite the bog standard conventional supernatural features (yawn), the film
was enjoyable nevertheless, with good acting, suspense invoked throughout and a
captivating storyline.
By Grace Montgomery
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