Mommy (2014)
This film succeeded in making me think and feel a lot of conflicting emotions. My sentiment switched several times being liking it and hating it, which is interesting in itself. First of all, I did think the special 1:1 aspect ratio works. It creates a very personal frame where everything looks like a portrait, making us focus on the people and not their surroundings. The change in the aspect ratio did feel a bit gimmicky, and that also came with some really annoying clichéd music montage scenes that made my eyes roll. However, I am not sure whether that is actually intentional, because the film completely shatters them afterwards, making it seem like a critique of similar happy montage sequences in other films. Here the montage doesn’t end with everything turning out for the better, rather the complete opposite. Things don’t improve. The brief glimpses of hope are quickly destroyed. Maybe the director intended me to hate that, or he is just pretentious. I am not sure.
The portrayal of the conflicting emotions for a struggling mother with a child that is difficult to put it mildly, effectively captures that there are no easy answers to come by. You can love, fear, resent and care for someone at the same time.
Other things are handled rather clumsily I think. The whole fictitious law wasn’t really needed and badly introduced at the beginning. The ending smeared it on pretty thick, adding a level of intensity to the dramatic situation that went overboard and removing the impact in the process. The film punctures its own complexity, which was a shame.
Hard to really make my mind up on this. Both hate and love parts of it, which may very well be intention given the subject matter where all conflicting states of mind exists at once.
Rating: 3.5