Relying on tone and atmosphere rather than just being jumpy!

Rating: 9/10 (28 November 2014)

Horror is a genre I have a love/hate relationship with. Many aspects of the genre are what got me interested in cinema in the first place. The music, the low angle shots, the sense of dread and unease and the memorable and tense scenes. However, I feel especially with modern horror, you really have to dig deep to find something of an alternative to the formulaic so called 'cattle prod' cinema which is churned out at such an unduly excessive rate. If you were to dig so deep and end up 'down under', you will find quite possibly a new saviour of this stagnant genre named Jennifer Kent who wrote and Directed this excellent film 'The Babadook'.
The film focuses on a family consisting of a struggling single mother Amelia (Essie Davis) and her wayward 7 year old son Samuel (Noah Wiseman). The background of the family is revealed to us in Amelia's dream sequence showing her husband dying in a drowning accident on the way to the hospital to give birth to Samuel. Now that his birthday is coming up, Amelia is haunted by this memory and prefers to celebrate Samuel's birthday a week or two after the actual date. With Samuel's over-active imagination, his obsession with making weapons and his fear of monsters under the bed and in the closet, Amelia becomes increasingly concerned. Her concern increasingly turns to anxiety and madness when his behaviour harms his young cousin when he pushes her off a tree house. When Amelia reads a story to Samuel at night when he gets scared, he picks out this mysterious book on the shelf called 'The Babadook'. The book has morbid, Gothic illustrations depicting a demon who comes into the house. When the narrative gets too scary, Amelia stops reading, but what she starts noticing is that more illustrations and narration appear on the pages, completing a horrific story of a women possessed murdering her dog and child. The Demon starts to appear in a cloaked, menacing, shadow like figure, turning Amelia's world into something frightening with a constant sense of foreboding. With her son's behaviour becoming more difficult, Amelia finds herself becoming like the character in the book.
For me, the film works brilliantly on a symbolic level. The book and the demon itself represents Amelia's darkest thoughts and what she is capable of if she keeps her tragic past buried. It is a film about the plight of a single mother and the terrifying thought that beneath the compassionate maternal motherly instincts of protecting her child, there may be dark thoughts of freeing herself from what can sometimes be a hopeless situation, particularly if you are dealing with behavioural problems. The story unfolds itself at a perfect pace and the scare's are more subtle and rooted in the characters. It is not only a film to scare, but a film which really connects in an emotional level making you feel sad at Amelia's situation, and you have much sympathy for Samuel too. Instead of concentrating on individual frights, I feel Jennifer Kent was going for a darkly atmospheric tone which remains consistent throughout the whole movie. There is constantly an unnerving sense of trepidation as you feel the narrative revealed to Amelia in the book is going to manifest itself in reality. You really don't want it to go that way as you care for the characters so much, but because 'you can't get rid if the Babadook' it feels like it might just happen.
There are a wide range of influences Kent utilises from both classic and modern horror respectively. We see Amelia watching old silent horror movies with a monster looking similar to the Babadook and there were parts that reminded me of 'The Grudge'. I feel that Kent really understands the genre, which is why I feel this is a step up from the majority of horror films which rely solely on fright and shock.
Essie Davis gives a very strong performance as the single mother who has an underlying fear and resentment of her child and Noah Wiseman gives an equally stunning performance as the boy who is in fear of his mother. I feel this kind of taboo subject matter works brilliantly in horror films as we are all afraid of our deep, underlying feelings which we choose to bury and ignore. Kent has made a fantastic debut here. Not only could it easily be best horror film this year, but one of the best films! Check out my film blog - www.projectionistreview.wordpress.com