Del Toro's 'Mama" Reawakens the Old-Fashioned Scare Fest

Annabel (Jessica Chastain) and her family are haunted by an invisible spirit, known as "Mama."

Director and producer Guillermo Del Toro certainly has built a noteworthy reputation for having a keen eye for discovering finely crafted dark fantasy shorts that fail to find themselves on the mainstream radar. Taking these shorts under his wing with the goal of expanding a tightly focused narrative into a full-fledged feature film adding his own signature flair is hardly a gamble for the experienced Del Toro, however his latest project Mama treads way too similar waters.

Based on a 2008 Spanish short, Mama opens with a tragic car crash, leaving its survivors, a pair of young sisters to fend for themselves in an abandoned cabin in the woods. Nearly five years without human contact, Victoria (Megan Charpentier) and Lily (Isabelle Nelisse) are at last rescued and later adopted by their uncle and his rocker girlfriend, Annabel (Jessica Chastain). Things take a turn for the stranger when the girls begin communicating to their invisible guardian affectionately called "Mama."

From the get-go, everything about Mama is sprinkled with a pinch of Del Toro's haunting charm we as audiences come to expect from a "Guillermo Del Toro Presents" release. Director Andres Muschietti finds himself slowly positioning the thrills and jump scares after Mama's tragic cold open, dropping an occasional clue as to who or what Mama is and what it is she wants.   

    

Fresh off her commanding lone-wolf performance in Kathryn Bigelow's Bin Laden manhunt, Zero Dark Thirty, Oscar nominee Jessica Chastain finds herself gifted with another superb opportunity as rocker chick Annabel, proving that once again she has earned the title, "Hollywood's Chameleon." Clashing with Mama's unorthodox maternal instincts, Chastain is provided more than enough screen time and empathetic moments to convey such a drastically different role than what audiences are accustomed to. But then again, hasn't each one of her performances already done that?

Ultimately, Chastain has to take command of the film when her onscreen boyfriend, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Game of Thrones) is forced onto the backburner. It's an eye-catching experience watching Chastain's Annabelle transform to a more responsible maternal role and bond with her two strange nieces, who technically aren't her responsibility.

Muschetti's Mama  finds much of its strength in coming across an old-school style thriller, dependent little on the shock value of gratuitous violence and so much more on being a slick ghost story. For a decent portion of Mama, what Mama exactly is remains unclear and has the audience questioning the psychological stability of the two girls against the possibility that there's a spirit afoot.

The two young girls in the middle of this ghostly disaster do fine with the confines of the film's derivative script. We've seen emotionally scarred children a dime a dozen in thrillers like Mama, rather Muschetti tweaks the formula transforming the duo into a pair blurring the lines between socially awkward and feral. The result is in fact creepy to a high degree, but the director plays the emotional well-being to the girls as a genuine as they find themselves caught in an intense push-pull struggle between Mama's supernatural guardianship and reality.    

Plenty of suspenseful buildup for almost two-and-a-half acts as a solid thriller still doesn't prepare audiences for a climax that alters the tone of the entire film, but in traditional Del Toro fashion should've been seen coming from a mile away. The rushed metaphorical finale and haphazardly rendered CGI comes off a bit underwhelming, but maintains enough grounded satisfaction to not be taken for a complete loop.

A few minor flaws aside, Mama emerges as an energetic spooky yarn that irons out a few kinks from the typical mix of thriller and fantastical roots synonymous with being a Guillermo Del Toro production.  

GRADE: B+ (8/10)