Goodnight Mommy (2022)

Score: 1 / 5

When Goodnight Mommy, a 2014 Austrian film, hit the international market, it shook the horror world much like Funny Games did in 1997. Insidiously designed, its haunting story creeps under your skin and reminds you that the scariest things are much closer than we expect. It tells the story of two young twin boys whose mother recently had facial reconstruction surgery and his heavily bandaged. Her behavior is different, though: she doesn't sing them their lullaby, she favors one twin over the other, and she is reclusive and quiet as she "recuperates" and self-medicates. The twins become convinced their mother has been replaced with a stranger and that they are in danger from this intruder. It's a stylish and starkly modern haunted house, with no small amount of horrific violence and gore by the end. It also broaches really disturbing taboo subjects, such as children enacting deadly violence and the disintegration of mother-child relationships in the most brutal way.

Naturally, as these things go, someone decided to produce an American remake. This one, dropped unceremoniously by Prime Video, is almost entirely a waste of time. Directed by Matt Sobel and written by Kyle Warren, the film repeats the story point-by-point almost the entire way; there are no new inventions, twists, or surprises. It's a profoundly gloomy affair, looking and feeling more like a standard Gothic mystery than anything, drenched in bluish green hues no doubt exaggerated by post-production manipulations. Its dismal palette seems to inform its energy, with lethargic pacing and muted sound, so much so that it feels more like watching a memory of a film than a film itself.

Without the inherent tension, this movie collapses under its own weight, even despite the considerable talents of its star, Naomi Watts, as "mother" (no name). Of course she's wonderful, but this isn't exactly the meatiest of roles as it is written in this version. Plus, she spends half the film peering out from white gauze bandages wrapped around her head, and Watts isn't exactly known for her physicality being any significant part of her craft. She does similar and better work elsewhere, and frankly this isn't the kind of story one wants to repeat with or without solid performances. The kids are played suitably, though the young actors could have used much stronger direction. But then the trouble with this adaptation comes in again, as the children decide to capture Mother and test her honesty to prove her identity. In the original, they resort to immediately brutal means of torture to elicit the information they want. Here, almost all the violence is absent, removing almost all the stakes and shock value (and even most scares) from the proceedings. And the lack of those elements isn't replaced with anything, making the film feel unbearably dull and void of reason to exist.

There is one small twist, in the film's oddly misshapen climax/denouement sequence, that reveals what's going on between the two boys. It's only scarcely different than the original, albeit slightly more violent, and does nothing to inform any character development for any of the characters. What's more, even this revelation feels lackluster after a nearly complete lack of suspense or tension leading up to it. I never cared about the central ambiguity the story needs in order to function: is Mother really their mother, and if she's not, what game is she playing with them? Actually, now that I think on it, Watts also starred in the American remake of Funny Games, and now I'm starting to rethink my opinion of her choices.