uncanny

Rating: 7/10 (17 January 2016)

A single mother struggles to cope with raising her troubled child. Having never faced up to the death of her husband, and possibly suffering depression of her own, she begins to suspect a supernatural presence in her home The Babadook is a disturbing genre hybrid, part horror, part psychological thriller. It evokes the uncanny in self-aware tonal moments, when daylight scenes can seem as threatening as the black of night. Amelia (an inspired Essie Davis) wanders around in a fug, sleep-deprived and still grieving seven years after the death of her husband. Amelia's problem is to resolve how she feels about her son Samuel, the inadvertent cause of her husband's death, born on the day of the car accident that took her spouse. How can a mother possibly not love her child? The manual Samuel (a quite startling performance from young Noah Wiseman) provides the answer. Samuel is what less-informed times used to refer to as 'a handful.' Is the Babadook real or a figment of Ameila's increasingly disturbed mind? The film does a wonderful job of exploring this central theme. Budget limitations at times show themselves - shadow is amply deployed, and sound design is a little less complex than required - but they hardly detract from a very satisfying example of a genre typified by Hitchcock's Vertigo. Highly recommended.