With Jessica Chastain nominated for an Oscar for her role in Zero Dark Thirty. Her presence in Mama, alone, should be enough to generate interest in Guillermo Del Toro’s latest supernatural thriller. Anyone expecting a Zero Dark Thirty-style action drama, though, will be sorely disappointed. And possibly a little scared.
Chastain plays the role of Annabel, a woman who welcomes her partner’s abandoned nieces into her home. They are traumatised and clearly disturbed. Annabel seems unsure whether or not she’s ready to look after them. Little does she know, however, that she’s opened the doors of her home to more than just the two young girls, who disappeared the day that their mother was murdered by their father. More of a psychological horror than a guts-n-gore kind of movie, del Toro knows exactly how to get inside the viewer’s mind and linger there, with his superb use of special effects and the kind of suspense tactics that will require the surgical removal of your fingers from the cinema seat by the time the movie’s over.
“Mama succeeds in scaring the wits out of us and leaving some lingering, deeply creepy images ...” Richard Roeper – Chicago Sun-Times
Watch the trailer for 'Mama'