Review: The Babadook

When I first saw The Babadook, I wasn’t expecting much, I’d initially wrote it off as another crappy jump-scare with a shitty title but some surprisingly strong word of mouth got me interested. Since then I have praised the film to no end and I still class it as one of the very best horror films I’ve ever seen, it is a disturbing, nerve-shredding and uncomfortably relatable film that shows just how destructive grief can become if left unchecked.

Set six years after her husband died in a car crash, taking her to the hospital, single mother Amelia is struggling to cope with her dreary job, her lonely life and her loud, shrill, annoying and disturbed son Samuel who has been getting into trouble with school for bringing home-made weapons in an effort to fight off monsters. In short she's about two nights without sleep away from her breaking point.

Things don't get any better when Amelia reads a strange children's book that somehow found its way into their home called Mister Babadook, what starts as something of a Grimms Fairytale poem turns into a truly disturbing and horrifying tale that puts the already troubled Samuel into a state of hysteria. Amelia tries to put the book behind her and out of the house but Samuel becomes convinced The Babadook is truly after him and his mother and starts to see him everywhere. Already on edge, Amelia starts to truly suffer mentally and physically from Samuel's screeching at night, while she tries to convince her son that The Babadook isn't real, some strange noises in the night and odd, horrifying visions around the house has her wondering if she's going crazy or if there really is something after her son.

That's about the main crux of the story, to get into any further detail about what happens in the house would be spoiling some really surprising moments that happen in the second half of the film. In short though, the story is one that combines a horrifying Children's book with the mental and emotional strain on a single mother who is struggling to cope with her own son. For the longest time you don't know how much of The Babadook is real and how much is just Amelia suffering from hallucinations brought on by lack of sleep and the trauma of remembering her husband's death. It's a fantastic story that works in conjunction with the characters and the theme of nightmares, both in children and adults, manifested by this terrible creation.

Also not to give it away but the ending is not what you would expect and leaves things on a strange but effective note.

Characters were really strong, particularly Amelia and Samuel. There was some smaller roles that showed how bad Amelia's life had become, her sister Claire has stopped coming round because she can't stand Samuel, her co-worker Robbie is interested in her but she can't enter into a relationship with Samuel needing constant care and attention and her next door neighbour Mrs Roach is a sweet old biddy who is worried about the two of them and how they're doing.

Noah Wieseman plays Samuel, now I don't know where this kid comes from, but holy fuck he has mastered the ability to screech and whine and cry and act like an annoying little shit. But that's why he worked, Samuel is suppose to screech and whine and cry, he's a kid that has such a strong belief in monsters and creatures in his room that he's damn near traumatised by them. You're suppose to see that his mother has been dealing with this strange, troubled kid for six years and understand how close she is to throttling the little bastard. Don't get me wrong, while Samuel is loud and shrill and lacking the ability to filter his thoughts from his voice, he's never knowingly annoying, like he's not obnoxious or selfish or being a brat because he likes it, he frequently tells his mother that he loves her and doesn't want to see her get her and even in the later parts of the movie he has to take up some tough moments in order to protect her. It's that important element of care and love that keeps Samuel from just turning into a horrible banshee of a kid, you can see why Amelia is nearing the edge of her sanity trying to keep him calm but you can also see why she loves him regardless.

Amelia herself, played by Essie Davis, is probably one of the strongest performances of the last decade and making me wonder why I've never heard of Davis before. Right from the start where we watch a pregnant Amelia being hurled into a car-crash we can see this is a troubled and traumatised woman, it just seems like nothing in her life has gone right and she's been getting by on fumes for several years now. Her job as a nurse at an old person's home is monotonous and dreary, her home is just as dull, her son is a pain in her neck that she is struggling to remember how to love and her love-life is non-existent, hell she can't even get herself off without fearing Samuel bursting in because of a nightmare. Put simply, she's starting to crack before the film’s even started.

The arrival of The Babadook story into her life sets off a series of events to proceed to exacerbate her already fractured psyche, as hard as she tries to tell Samuel it's all in his head the strange noise she hears at night tell her otherwise, and that's just the start. Worsened by her lack of sleep and emotional turmoil, Amelia starts seeing things, things that seem so real at the time that you don't even know what to think about them until you realise that's going on. Holes in the wall, creatures on her ceiling, a strange, nightmarish montage of old-timey Black & White horror shorts in which the Babadook finds a way to infect her visions and mental capacity. The harder she tries to tell herself it's all in her head the harder The Babadook forces her to realise it's not.

Again this is only part of the story, when things get really turned around in the later parts of the movie we get a different side to Amelia that really brings out Davis' acting prowess that bring out a new aspect of the character, one that adds to the story and the general sense of what has become of her. Davis is phenomenal capturing all aspects of Amelia’s character, from her undercurrent of depression in the start, to her furious retribution at the dn, you can almost feel her emotions radiating out the screen with simple looks and blow-out monologues, she easily takes this film from great to brilliant alone.

A short note on Mister Babadook himself, this is one fuckin freaky creation, a cross between Freddy Kruger and The Man In Black, he's this strange looking motherfucker with long clawed hands and a permanent white smile hidden beneath a trench coat and a top hat. He looks normal and abnormal at the same time which creates this mix of something that looks human but clearly isn't and your brain can't handle it and you just see something dangerous and terrifying. It's a great creative piece that gives us a horrible new horror villain.

Director Jennifer Kent gives us her opening debut feature and sets the bar pretty fuckin high for horror directors to come and definitely grabs my attention for her next film. Kent understands two major components about horror that a lot of modern films miss out on. 1: It's important to care about the people that are involved. And 2: What we don't see is always scarier than what we do see. She tackles the first one by building up the relationships between Amelia and Samuel and everyone around them, it takes the time to show us how bad Amelia's life is at the current moment before Mister Babadook even enters her life and even longer before things get out of control. I'm actually surprised as hell to learn this film is only 94 minutes long because it does feel longer but I mean that in a good way, the slow pace is exactly what the film needs to drag out the terror, make it feel like things are being stretched out and never-ending, it uses its time really damn well to be able to get an entire storyline and a long, draining sense of terror in just over an hour and a half. If someone told me this film was 2 hours long I wouldn't be surprised.

That slow pace works wonders for setting the tone of Amelia’s life being a twisting knife, everything she does blows up in her face and she can’t win anymore. Which leads into the main theme of the film, the power of grief, of course Amelia is depressed, every time she looks at her son she’s reminded of her husband’s death, maybe blaming herself for not being able to hold back her pregnancy that few seconds longer to avoid the car accident, maybe even blaming Samuel for it. Mister Babadook represents that pent up aggression, that venomous anger coursing through Amelia and finally having an outlet and risking hurtng everyone around her because she’s not had the ability to grieve properly. I applaud Kent for how she’s been able to use that, taking a very real emotional turmoil and translating it to a horror movie adds so many new layers for the film and the characters to work with, granted it’s not a new idea, puberty has been used as an analogy in horror for years while Don’t Look Now, The Changling and The Descent have touched upon loss in regards to horror for decades, but Kent’s inclusion of Samuel as a tear in Amelia’s character, a son she loves and adores but a constant reminder of what she’s lost, takes this film into a new area and I loved where it went.

The scare tactics of the film are so much stronger than most modern horror films because rather than just giving you a quick fright and moving on, this film actively sets out to slowly but surely grind your nerves down. It's slow building pace is one of the reason it works so well, all the terror and horror that you face gets worse and worse as the film goes on, it starts off with just strange bumps and noises from outside to put you on edge but the more the film goes on, the worse it gets, getting deeper into Samuel's fear over this unseen being which is terrifying in its own right because of how convinced he is that this creature is right next to him, building into disturbing visions of roaches and shadows that put Amelia's mind in question over her sanity and how far down the rabbit hole she's going, and all of this before The Babadook even shows his face. By the time the final act comes into play you're more terrified over that the hell is going to happen next than anything that might jump out and give you a quick fright, I mean this is one fuckin intense movie, it does not let up or go easy on you, this film actively wants you to sit there in fear, wondering what dark turn the film will take next to drive its characters deeper into the ground.

Not to give anything away but there's one scene that I guarantee certain people will hate.

In the years since I first saw The Bababook, my feelings on it have just improved with every viewing to the point where I can comfortably call this the best horror film of the last decade, this is a true blue psychological horror at its strongest rather than some shitty flick with teenagers and jump scares. The strong, mentality based plotline of a troubled mother struggling with her disturbed son and her own depression makes for a story you can get much more invested in and that's not even bringing up what happens in the second half of the film. Performances are incredible from the two leads, Amelia especially stands out as one that needs to be remembered and recognised and Kent kicks off her career with a slow paced, intense and twisted direction that brings a breath of fresh air into modern horror. This is the film horror fans need to see to prove there is still life in the genre yet.

10/10