The Babadook

Jennifer Kent's The Babadook is one of the most unnerving horror films I've seen in a long time.  Most successful horror movies work as a thrill ride, giving you a jolt and making you feel uneasy while you're watching them.  This movie gets completely under your skin, and manages to stay there for its entire running time.  Even more important, it doesn't fade from your mind the instant you walk out of the theater.

The trailer would lead you to believe that this is a supernatural film about a boogeyman who lurks in the dark corners of a little boy's room.  And while there is certainly a dark presence lurking in the home of the two main characters, Kent's screenplay (which is inspired by a 2005 short film she made titled Monster) goes much deeper than that for its thrills.  The movie is also about the pressures of motherhood, and a woman who seems to be at wit's end when it comes to her son.  The mother is Amelia (Essie Davis) who, even as the film opens, looks like she has been awake more or less the past six or seven years that her son, Samuel (Noah Wiseman), has been on this earth.  What little sleep she does get is usually plagued by nightmares concerning the night her husband died, which also happens to be the day Samuel was born.  The couple was in a car accident while Amelia was in labor and on her way to the hospital, and the husband did not survive.

The mother shows love for the son, but there is also obviously resentment.  The boy has more or less trapped her in her own home, as whenever they are outside, the boy acts out, or is a terror to the other children.  It's gotten so bad that he is suspended from his school.  Now Amelia's sister, Claire (Hayley McElhenney), won't even talk to her anymore, because little Samuel pushed Claire's young daughter out of the tree house after the two kids had an argument.  When the mother and child are alone together at home, things are not much better.  Samuel is clingy, frequently throws fits, and often designs crude yet dangerous weapons to protect both himself and his mother from invisible enemies who he thinks are lurking under his bed.  It's gotten so bad that the boy often won't let Amelia sleep at night.  There is talk of "specialists" helping Samuel to work through his issues, but it almost seems too late for both him and his mother.

The main plot kicks off one night when Samuel asks his mom to read him a book that she does not recognize, or knows how it got on his shelf in the first place.  It's an extremely bleak children's story about a monster named the Babadook who terrorizes children once someone lets the creature inside the house.  Later that very night, Samuel insists that the Babadook is in his closet, waiting for him to fall asleep.  Amelia destroys the wicked book, tearing up its pages and throwing it in the trash.  But then, a couple days later, she finds it lying on her front step.  Someone has not only patched the pages back together, but also has somehow added some new disturbing pages about the titular monster possessing a mother, and forcing her to cause harm to her son, their pet dog, and eventually herself.  It's at this point we start wondering if the mother is losing her mind.  Or perhaps it is the boy.  Of course, there's always the option that this is all very real, and the family is in danger.

Unlike a lot of thrillers, The Babadook does not cheat with its answers, nor does it lose our interest once the movie starts to wind down.  It is smart to keep us somewhat in the dark as to what is really happening.  So much of the film is seen through the exhausted eyes of the mother, we start to wonder what's real, and what is being created by a sleep-deprived mind.  The monster itself represents two things - childhood nightmares becoming real, and the very real frustrations of motherhood.  As the film unravels, so does Amelia's sanity.  She begins lashing out at her son more often, and at times doesn't seem like herself.  Is she being controlled by the monster as the book suggests, or has she simply gone over the edge, and doesn't know how to pull herself back to normal?  The movie leaves us guessing up until the end, which in one light, may be a traditional monster movie ending.  Or perhaps not.  It's all how you choose to look at it.

Kent's storytelling and simple yet gripping visual style would be enough to make this film stand above the usual horror claptrap Hollywood pushes out every year, but it's the performances that really push this material into great filmmaking.  Noah Wiseman, as young Samuel, delivers what can easily be considered one of the most intense child performances ever.  He can be sympathetic, hurtful, hateful, eerie, funny, and sweet - just like a real troubled child.  Essie Davis is just as excellent, delivering a performance that seems constantly on the edge of sanity, and at times beyond it.  Both of these actors are playing characters who are trapped with one another, and are acting out in different ways.  And when it seems that something that cannot be explained enters their already chaotic world, the two actors do a fantastic job of delivering a sense of dread and hopelessness.

The Babadook does so much more than simply put you on edge.  It is just as much a drama as it is a supernatural story, and it is successful on both fronts.  It knows how to tap into childhood fears of the dark and the unknown, yet it also knows how to create characters who are flawed, broken and very human.  There's not a single wrong note to be found here, and it takes its place as one of 2014's very best films. 

See the movie times in your area or buy the DVD at Amazon.com!

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