Redbox Review of mother!

I just watched the absolutely insane mother! Spoilers ahead. Be ye warned.

Less than 20 films have ever received an "F" from the audience Cinemascore and mother! is one of them. It also got some very good reviews from critics. Darren Aronofsky only makes movies that people either love or hate. There's not a lot of space in-between.

I braced myself for crazy, but this movie is far crazier than you can even anticipate. This movie can best be described with three letters. W.T.F.

Aronofsky is a skilled craftsman and his directing style cannot be matched. He also gets great performances from his actors and he has a great cast here. Everyone is perfect and his maddening style fits perfectly here. Some similar directing styles to Black Swan but this movie is all by itself.

Now for the crazy. You're constantly wondering what is going on even from the opening shot of a woman peacefully burning to death with a single tear. It just gets crazier from there. It's a slow burn kind of crazy until the final act where chaos explodes in a way you could never see coming. The climax of the chaos is the dismembering and then feasting of a newborn. Yes, that is actually what happens.

Aronofsky gives no explanation of what happened. It leads you along driving you almost as mad as the mother character trying to figure out what is going on. I had to look up online to see what happened. Here's a quote from Darren Aronofsky giving his view of how the movie came to him...

"It is a mad time to be alive. As the world population nears 8 billion we face issues too serious to fathom: ecosystems collapse as we witness extinction at an unprecedented rate; migrant crises disrupt governments; a seemingly schizophrenic US helps broker a landmark climate treaty and months later withdraws; ancient tribal disputes and beliefs continue to drive war and division; the largest iceberg ever recorded breaks off an Antarctic ice shelf and drifts out to sea. At the same time we face issues too ridiculous to comprehend: in South America, tourists twice kill rare baby dolphins that washed ashore, suffocating them in a frenzy of selfies; politics resembles sporting events; people still starve to death while others can order any meat they desire. As a species our footprint is perilously unsustainable yet we live in a state of denial about the outlook for our planet and our place on it. From this primordial soup of angst and helplessness, I woke up one morning and this movie poured out of me like a fever dream. All of my previous films gestated with me for many years but I wrote the first draft of mother! in 5 days. Within a year we were rolling cameras."

Another quote from Aronofsky shows us what the film is an allegory for...

"Lawrence is Gaia, or Mother Earth, while her house represents the world -- a living, breathing organism being destroyed by its inhabitants. Her husband, known as 'Him' in the film, is God. Out of boredom, he creates Adam and Eve (the couple), who proceed to destroy both Gaia's creation and His study (the Garden of Eden), which holds God's perfect crystal (the apple). Their quarreling sons are Cain and Abel. They also bring worshipers to praise God, who keep sitting on mother's unsupported sink, and eventually, cause the pipes to burst into a 'Great Flood'. God impregnates mother, who gives birth to the Messiah -- a chaotic sequence followed by a disquieting communion and Revelations."

Once I read that, it made a lot of sense. It actually makes me want to watch it again. I don't necessarily agree with the vision, but I find it fascinating. You walk away from this movie feeling anger and apparently that is how he wants you to feel. The movie also feels like your experiencing a dream. The way the mother character never really knows what is going on and how things change so drastically really feels like a dream.

What I mostly disliked about the movie was the fact that I had no clue what was going on and I only got a glimpse of it when I read the above quotes online after the movie. mother! is very avant-garde and that is not a genre I typically enjoy. If this story was allegorical, tell the viewer that within the movie. I don't like leaving a film feeling confused.

I usually know what I feel about a film as the credits roll. I can spout out a rating from 1 to 10 right away. It took me several hours to finally figure out what I felt about this movie (and honestly, I'm still not sure). I liked it as I was watching it until the crazy final act. I hated it for a bit, but never completely. I then read about it online and felt a little better but still didn't like it. I eventually ended up liking it some for it's bold choices, amazing film-making/directing/acting while still questioning some choices. I can't get this movie out of my head and I like it the more I think about it. It's a remarkable movie that pushes all your buttons. In the end, I would give it 7/10.