Skip to main content

The Babadook (2014) - Jennifer Kent


The best horror movie of 2014 is definitely Jennifer Kent's The Babadook. This movie is beyond creepy and crawly. It does such a great job of getting under your skin. It has a fantastically deep concept that is pulled off in a really well way. It is wonderfully acted and exceptionally written. I know it sounds like I am praising it a lot. But this is really a fantastic film in the genre. 

This movie has layers. It's a depressing tale about a broken, widowed single mother that is raising the worst child in the world. Her life is horrible and her time is completely taken up by this hellion. A mysterious children's book shows up one day and begins to terrorize their little family. This book warns about the coming of a figure known as Mister Babadook. 

A supernatural and psychological terror begins to unfold as we watch this mother deal with a possession. Deal with fighting this unknown antagonist and simultaneously taking care of her child. It shows the her deteriorated mental state as she falls deeper into her possession and we are shown this neglect. This doesn't just start to become scary because of this Mister Babadook character. You start to worry for the mother. Root for the mother. It's really quite a fantastic ride. 

Jennifer Kent has done a magnificent job here. It's really promising since this is her debut film. Essie Davis' performance was amazing. Award worthy even. Everything from top to bottom is great. It really can't get much better. Of course I recommend this one. It isn't a movie that you are going to forget. If you liked the Grudge... this is much better. 

Director: Jennifer Kent
Country: Australia

Did ya know...
Jennifer Kent and Essie Davis were mates in drama school. William Friedkin, the director of 'The Exorcist', said "I've never seen a more terrifying film than 'The Babadook'".

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Ju-On (2000) - Takashi Shimizu

Watching Japanese horror is similar to watching British comedy. If you enjoy dry whit then you probably enjoy the boys of Monty Python in drag. That's the joke, they're dressed like women. Get it? Well, that's British humor. But if you're like most Americans you probably prefer Adam Sandler farting his way across a football field and hooking up with chicks that are way out of his league. Americans usually prefer this more in your face, crass brand of humor. My point is funny in England is different from funny in the US. The same goes for J-Horror. What the Japanese consider scary is very different from what Americans consider scary and it shows in this horror film. Japanese horror is generally slow (a little too slow sometimes), suspenseful and creepy. Ju-On is a creepy effing film. The movie has almost no soundtrack. It is incredibly suspenseful and the pay-offs are pretty awesome, but I think that it was done better in the American version (cultural t...

Le Diable au Convent (1899) - George Melies

Le Diable au Convent is longer than the two previous Georges Méliès ventures into short form horror. This particular French short shows the Devil himself running a convent and terrorizing the poor old nuns that live there. However he is finally vanquished by the good of Faith. This is yet another Méliès classic, showcasing the art work that really goes into his short film-making. This is one of the earliest examples of a horror movie that could rely on its elaborate set design and artistic design. Everything in this film, although horribly aged, has been packaged extremely well. If you are a fan of production and set design then I would highly recommend just about anything that Melies has his name on. Though nothing that is considered too extreme actually happens, Satan does have his way with a convent. The satanic imagery itself must have kept this film on the traveling carnival circuit. It certainly wouldn’t fit into the good moral bag that society shoved i...

Spookies (1986) - Genie Joseph, Thomas Doran, and Brendan Faulkner

It's impossible to get a decent movie when you take two films and just squash them together. That is essentially the story of how this movie came together. The film started as Twisted Souls. However, according to the financial backer they didn't have enough horror. So they ended up hiring another guy to come in and add a monster in virtually every scene.  This movie started out being directed by Brendan Faulkner and Thomas Doran. It basically is the tale of two sets of teenagers that arrive to a strange building surrounded by a strange cemetery. It was your usual tale of teenagers in a big hows with a few monsters. Then they brought in Genie Joseph and added even more. Like a haunted birthday party, a murderous cat-man, zombies, and an old wizard. It really became a smorgasbord of horror with a very thin plot-line leading it around. This movie is hard to summarize in a conventional way. It just packs so much.  The most interesting part of this movie are ...