Motherhood Can Be Bad, Movies Can Be Worse.

There are no shortage of horror movies that deal with the inherent terror of impending motherhood. I've jotted a few words in past entries about some of the more famous "motherhood is horrifying" movies out there. Tonight, we'll touch on a few others.

Enjoy.

Baby Shower - 2011

Watching this movie inspired my need to create this post.

The gist:
A pregnant woman invites her best friends to visit her at her isolated home (wait for it....) in the jungle? She then throws a fit and accuses ONE OF THEM of having an affair with her husband. And how did she learn of this affair, you ask? Well. Despite not having seen any of these friends for an undisclosed amount of time that is implied to be very long, she heard other women gossiping about it at the local beauty parlor.

Now THAT sounds like a legitimate reason to call a meeting in which to hurl accusations at your friends.

Then. A random hippy woman shows up and someone starts murdering people.

I don't even know who the killer turns out to be because I made it through roughly 75% of the movie and then had to turn it off. Me. Turning off movies. What the hell is this world coming to?!

I think it was made in Chile. If it were American, I'd assume it was made for the Lifetime network; the acting was terrible, and the effects were all digital and so low budget that they were a distraction from whatever plot there was.

I can't even provide you the bonus torture of watching the trailer, I can't find one.

Grace - 2009

I knew I loved Grace the first time I watched the trailer. Since its release, I've made it my mission to make as many people as possible watch it.

The gist:
Young couple is about to have a baby. Husband dies in a car accident, wife survives. Baby dies. In utero. Mother carries baby to term.

Now, if that description alone doesn't make you feel a little queasy while you're reading it - I'm ready to push you right over the edge: mother gives birth to stillborn baby, then wills her back to life. And while zombie baby may look adorable, apparently, teething is a real bitch with this one.

What else can I say? Be careful what you wish for. Any baby that you will back to life won't be what you expect. Seriously. Read Pet Sematary. Sometimes, dead is better.

If zombie babies chewing off your nipples isn't squirm-inducing enough, we'll add some GILF action to that with a little touch of mother fetish... what's the one where you like to drink breast milk because it gets you sexually excited? Anyway...

I love Grace because it's actually quite subtle and is immensely unsettling. It really gets under your skin and you'll find yourself thinking back to moments in the movie and feeling that creeping sting of nausea crawling up your throat.

I will note here that Grace is tellingly written by a man (Paul Solet); it screams, "I am terrified of procreation and birth and womanhood". I read a great interview with him about making Grace, but he neglected to mention this terror. I'm pretty sure it's a thing though.

Watch it. You'll see.

Watch the trailer here and fall as crazily in love as I did:

The Witch (2015)

You know the drill - there's ALWAYS spoilers. Don't want the movie ruined for you, come back after you've seen it. Also - I'm still without an editor - typos and bad grammar await you! I keep hoping that the cultural obsession with zombies will end; literally every other damn movie that comes 'round seems to feature some sort of shambling, undead being bent on devouring the weak flesh of regular humans. Once upon a time, zombies have have been used as a metaphor for the blind consumerism created by our capitalist society, or the perceived depletion of resources by immigrants, or even the ravages of time and disease on our frail bodies. Now it seems that the deeper social commentary has been lost as audiences mindlessly consume "zombie fiction" in an attempt to keep up with trends. ( How very meta - a film buddy of mine commented on this assessment! ) All of this is just a sideways rant, leading up to my actual point: it seems that zombie may actually...

Mother!

Alright friends and readers–this one is probably doubly filled with typos and grammar errors because I wrote it while angry. Good luck and happy reading. There are unpopular opinions in every realm. As a film student, you can truly strike a nerve when you say things like, "I fucking hate the self-indulgence of independent films and the way people idolize them." Or, you know, "Low lighting and slow pacing does not a good movie make." Or whatever. You can of course, objectively, understand how this happens. When you are creating art–when you are outside the system so to speak–you are free to explore things (subjects, techniques, etc.) that may need to be addressed and that freedom can become intoxicating and go to one's head. While it may seem only right or only fair to respect and accept each creative endeavor that every artist undertakes, it is unreasonable to believe that the world will remain forever patient with the self-obsession artists have. Th...

The Babadook

Spoilers and typos! Enjoy. We often look back nostalgically on childhood, envious of the joy we felt and the boundless imaginations we possessed. How conveniently we forget the other side of that coin: as children, we experience a depth of terror our adult selves continually try to recreate for cathartic entertainment. When we try to bring those childhood fears to life on the screen, we often end up with movies about "things that go bump in the night," which is a somewhat superficial approach. While it does provide an opportunity for a supernatural experience, it ignores the root of our fear: the unknown . As children, we lack life experience. We lack nuance. We lack understanding. Not knowing creates in us fear. Yes, we fear what lurks in the darkness but we also fear the adult world because we do not understand how it works. The Babadook works to exploit both those fears. The short story: a widowed mother of a young boy experiences a mental breakdown and tries to...

i'm kael's ghost

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