babadook dook dook

Rating: 7/10 (26 March 2017)

If you want a movie to thrill your inner demons you have to look no further than the Babadook. This psychological horror delves into the symbolic spectrum of our innermost monsters brought to life in a transition from outer to inner demons that torment the troubled mother. Can this monster be overcome through love and the will power of the mother is the real question that thrills the viewer throughout this film. This story centers around two characters, Samuel and Amelia, a child and single mother still plagued by the loss of her husband and Samuel's father. The bleak ambient lighting combined with the dull misc-en-scene of the gray lifeless house in which most of the story takes place help the audience to sympathize with the troubled mother and express her grief burdened world. At the same time throughout the film the child's high pitched screams and reckless behavior from his overactive imagination and fear of monsters further agitates the mother's fragile state. With this atmosphere in place the monster created straight from a child's imagination is introduced through a storybook. The monster who only gets stronger the more it is denied torments the little family and the mother especially. The mother becomes through her denial of the monster the monster herself. This psychological transition is seen as her outbursts towards her son's behavior continues to grow in ferocity. This grows and the monster grows as well and allows the viewer to see the parallel and the question again becomes can she overcome that monster.