a great movie about grief and moving on, and about how we accept ourselves. forget the bad reviews, the film is great, just not your "normal" horror flick. i can relate to it.

Rating: 8/10 (11 June 2020)

Now, i would love to make this review without spoilers. but...well what is the babadook? the babadook represents moving on. it represents our demons and how we manage them. before the babadook Amelia was in denial with her life: she couldn't accept what she was now. her son. her dead husband. the people around her. she thought she was coping well but she wasn't
the babadook is about how we cope with our inner demons. how we deal with them and confront them. Amelia tried to hide them since her son was born. she was never able to deal wih the fact that her life couldn't be the same anymore. that her son needed specific attention. that her husband was not there. the babadook was her way to cope with all of her inner pain. that's why he is now in the basement. that's why Samuel is finally having a birthday party: she was able to fight with her inner demons, to (literally)spit them out - and by doing so, she solved her emotional luggage. it's still there because pain never goes away, but now it's controlled. the babadook was her way to realize she never moved on. was her way to finally start moving forward.
so many things we might not talk about in our life. not only someone we love that is dead, but some incident we feel ashamed or sad, bullying, one of our failures... and we don't talk about it. then it slowly becomes a huge thing because we were never capable to deal with it. the babadook is that: is our inner pain that we keep kinda sleeping but in the right moments it comes to attack us. this was her process to overcome these conflicts. being set around the time of the accident is very accurate because it's the time where she remembers everything the most. and she feels the most pain.
the movie doesn't want to explain everything, even though everything it's in the movie. but if you're used to see "horror" as some jumpscares with all the plot explained is normal you won't enjoy this that much. like in aster or eggers movies horror here is just the way to communicate what this is about: if it was a drama about a grieving mom that can't deal with her own life and "peculiar" son it wouldn't be as interesting. by having an horror twist into it you can make those demons real. and make the public scared, because there is some scary stuff here.
so a technically great film with cool interpretations and a very accurate and deep metaphor. i liked this very much and i can relate very hard to it: if he was alive it would have been the 67th birthday of my father, on june 11 - i finished watching this already after midnight but for me it's still june 11. somehow it makes me feel it's not a coincidence. one thing i'm certain: everyone will have babadook moments in their lives. sometimes pain is inevitable. sometimes it will hurt. and it won't be about how we fight it. it woulbe about how we will accept it.
it's well shot, and the sound effects are awesome. i liked both of the main actors and also the characters. the kid is annoying sometimes but he is human. the mom falls into the verge of madness but at the end of the day her son, her family is able to save her from herself.