You know you're in trouble when the scariest thing in a horror film is how boring it is. Mama is not merely a bad horror film. Rather---Mama is an insulting horror film. It insults the intelligence of the audience, it insults other horror films and worst of all---it insults we the audience's expectations by expecting us to be scared by stuff that has been done bigger and better in hundreds of other horror films. Never have I seen a film that relies so heavily on those "got ya" moments. You know...the moments where you suddenly hear a loud noise or see something that you didn't know was there. It's particularly sad to see those moments in this film because there are one or two quieter moments in the film that are effectively creepy but then are ruined by a "got ya" moment.
In the film...Jessica Chastain and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau play Annabel and Lucas...a couple who have been hunting down Lucas's long-lost nieces for years. When the nieces are finally found...Annabel and Lucas take them home to live with them. Little do they know that nieces Victoria and Lily have been living with a monster all this time. Oh yeah and the monster goes wherever they go therefore bringing them into their new home.
The film's opening scene is actually very well done. That is until a monster appears and it then becomes a typical horror movie scene. The film then piles on dumb, tedious scene after dumb, tedious scene just waiting for viewers to be scared. We the viewers are not. In fact.....Texas Chainsaw had more genuine scares than this. I say this not only because I was more scared and entertained by Texas Chainsaw but because there were 5 year old children in both films. A 5 year old in the theater was covering his eyes during Texas Chainsaw while a 5 year old in the theater for Mama leaned over to his parents at the end of the film and said "that wasn't scary." The worst part about all this is that it was executive produced by Guillermo Del Toro who can generally make any horror movie scarier just by being on the set. Here, however---even Del Toro can't save this mess.
I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised that Mama is typical, bottom of the barrel Hollywood horror trash. It did get a release in the middle of January...the month where studios put their unwanted films into release. However---Chastain is way too good for this role and the film lacks even one genuine scare. If you are going to see Mama...don't expect for it to give you any restless nights. That is---unless you fall asleep in the theater which in that case...I can't blame you.
(1/2 out of 5 Stars, The film is rated PG-13 for violence and terror, some disturbing images and thematic elements)
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