This short review contains spoilers.
I expected this film to be far scarier. It had an amazing number of jump scares, but not the tension building slower moments to thread these scares together effectively. Sure, there was the scene in the kitchen where The Other Mommy was clutching to the underside of the table, body spidered around it or the moments she suddenly sprung from ball pits, beds, or hung from the ceiling. Jump, jump, jump. But most scary to me was the very real commentary on motherhood and bodily autonomy.
While perhaps both too on the nose, and not doing enough, the movie does try to address the trauma of motherhood physically, psychologically, and emotionally. The Real Mommy actually articulates this in saying there were parts of herself she wasn’t ready to give up and that she wanted to be free. Unlike fathers, mothers have to give up parts of themselves. And while this is not restricted to our bodies, this is, for many of us, something that is forever changed.
In one of the end scenes the Real Mommy explains that she cried because she didn’t want to have children but Daddo cried because he was happy. While many may no doubt judge this character (for this, for cheating with Daddo, for cheating with Uncle Frank) this scene was incredibly sad to me. She refuses her own bodily autonomy for unstated reasons. Maybe to give in to Daddo’s wishes, her mother’s, society’s? She loves her child of course but is now trapped in a domesticity she didn’t desire. To escape or to reclaim autonomy she cheats with Uncle Frank, just like when she cheated with Daddo.
One thing I find interesting is this thread of bodily autonomy that presumably the Real Mommy has passed down to her daughter. When asked to hug Uncle Frank, she says no and her mother and father don’t try to make her. Frank does coerce her into a high five, but not asking more than once. When Real Mommy comes home “smelling different” and tries to boop her nose, she refuses and Real Mommy respects this. On the flip side of this the evil Other Mommy also needs permission to enter her heart. While this is also about consent, the Other Mommy crosses many other boundaries.
I enjoyed watching the film but I thought it was the ending like four times. It just didn’t stick the landing. However, I did appreciate that in the end, all the little girl had to do was say NO and it left me wondering if she had done that from the start if there would have been so many jump scares.
