The Babadook

The Babadook, available on Netflix stream, was definitely not what I expected. From the trailer I imagined it would have a large storybook influence, like Mama or Don't Be Afraid of the Dark, but that's only part of it. This film focuses on what's truly horrifying in life, like depression, grief, and the hardships of motherhood. The cinematography was excellent, and the actress who played the mother was superb. This is the scariest horror movie I've seen since The Conjuring, and one I don't know if I could ever watch again because it is such a painfully dark film to watch.

SPOILERS AHEAD: 

The babadook is portrayed as a physical villain in this film, and it turns out that he is more than that. The babadook is a metaphor for what happens when you bottle up painful emotions. The mother had lost her husband the same day her son was born. The movie takes place seven years later where she still cannot talk about her late husband, or even celebrate her son's birthday because it's too painful to think about. The babadook represents the dark depression that festered  when she continued to suppress her painful emotions.  For me, the best part of the film was the ending. For the mother, the death of her husband is something that will always cause her moments of sadness, but it's the way she handles and controls that emotion so it will not spiral out of control.  In the film, she literally controls that emotion (the babadook) by chaining him up in the basement and feeding him once a week. And the most important part of all is she's no longer afraid of the babadook (her emotions).  

END SPOILERS

I loved the eerie drawings in the pop-up book shown in the film. They were illustrated by Alexander Juhasz, who also happened to work on the intro to the television show United States of Tara  and Netflix's The Little Prince. It's a black and white story book that the mother reads to her son, and the further they continue the story the more cryptic it becomes. The illustrations of the people in the storybook reminded me of illustrator Dave McKean, who worked on the cover art for the comic The Sandman, as well as the film Mirrormask. The concept design for the creature of the babadook seemed to be heavily inspired by early silent horror movies. I'm a huge fan of early horror films, and I love that the babadook paid homage to these classic films. You can see the similarities of the babadook and Nosferatu, as well as the Professor Burke character in London After Midnight. 

The legendary Lon Chaney as Profesor Burke in London After Midnight, 1927

Nosferatu, 1922

The Babadook storybook

Overall: 10/10
Trigger warning(s): mental illness, child abuse