Mother, May I (Die)? an Analysis of Motherhood in Horror Films
Mother, May I (Die)? An Analysis of Motherhood in Horror Films
Masterarbeit
Zur Erlangen des akademischen Grades des Masterstudium Medien an der Philosophisch-Kulturwissenschaftlichen Fakultät an der Leopold-Franzens-Universität Innsbruck
Institut für Medienwissenschaft
Eingereicht bei: PD Mag. Dr. Christian Quendler Eingereicht von: Rebecca Lee Lennington
Innsbruck, November 2018
Mother, May I (Die)?
Acknowledgements 3
1 Introduction 3
2 Motherhood 7 2.1 Recruiting Mothers 7 2.2 Psychoanalytic view 9 2.3 Postmodern Family 10 2.4 Barbara Creed on Monstrous Women 13
3 Domestic Mother 13 3.1 The Placeholder Mother 14 3.2 The Mother Meal 15 3.2.1 The Others 15 3.2.1.2 Discussion of The Others 23 3.2.2 Mother! 24 3.2.4 Discussion of Mother! 26
4 Mentally Vulnerable Mothers 27 4.1 Understanding Grief 27 4.2 Overview of the Mentally Vulnerable Mother 28 4.2.1 The Babadook 29 4.2.1.2 Discussion of The Babadook 37 4.3 Hereditary 38 4.3.1 Discussion of Hereditary 50 4.4 Lights Out 52 4.4.1 Discussion of Lights Out and further analysis 58
4 Heroic Mothers 59 4.1 The Warrior 60 4.1.1 Orphan 61 4.1.2 Discussion of Orphan 69 4.1.3 Poltergeist 70 4.1.4 Discussion of Poltergeist 75 4.2 The Saint 76
5 Corrupting Mothers 78 5.1 Corrupting Mother 79 5.2.1 1922 80 5.2.1.2 Discussion of 1922 83 5.2.2 Carrie 84 5.2.2.1 Discussion of Carrie 88 5.2.3 Psycho 88 5.2.3.1 Discussion Of Psycho 92
6 Conclusion 93
Works Cited 96 Lennington 2 Mother, May I (Die)?
Acknowledgements This work is dedicated to all three of my Heroic Mothers--my mom, my dad and my step-mom. They didn’t have to endure stab wounds or fight their way through Hell and back to be my Warriors.Their selflessness brought me to Innsbruck and allowed me to stay.
Thank you to every professor I’ve had at the University. I have learned from each of you and I will be going home a more intelligent, confident person because of you.
And finally, thank you Professor Quendler for being my advisor. Your patience and understanding was invaluable and allowed me to finish my thesis with a clear head.
Lennington 3 Mother, May I (Die)?
1 Introduction
Horror films explore blurred distinctions. The lines between living and dead, material and immaterial, good and evil, safe and unsafe are constantly complicated within the genre. This is what makes women in horror an interesting topic to explore. Specifically, women who have given birth embody these blurred boundaries. Within the womb of a mother, matter transitions from non-life to life. The woman is therefore completely unique in nature, her body is the only vector for the transition from matter to life, while there are myriad vectors for the opposite transition from life to matter (this transition of course being death). The connection between life and death and the transition from one state to the other, will be discussed in greater depth throughout the course of this thesis. The horror films reviewed in this thesis were chosen according to their social relevancy, and include both modern films and ones dating as far back as the 1960s. To determine social relevancy, the Internet Movie Database (IMDb.com) was consulted, particularly with regard to their rankings of horror films. Movies were chosen from the list of Highest Rated Horror Feature Films With At Least 25000 Votes1. The films had to have a mother character either physically or as a symbol relevant to the plot. The films had to be in English and be explicitly classified as horror according to the website. Throughout the course of the research, it became quickly apparent that there is a paucity of Mothers of Color and non-heteronormative storylines. Indeed, most of the films involve characters who fall into the category of middle to upper class Caucasians. This must be acknowledged, as the analysis of the portrayal of motherhood will inherently leave large portions of the population unaddressed because they are simply underrepresented within the genre. It must also be noted here that this research centers around cisgendered women. The literature read and referred to also focused entirely on cisgendered men and women. As this research will reveal, the genre in general would benefit from a greater diversity of characterization. Additionally, in this examination of the filmic representation of mothers the perceived sexism of the genre will be explored.
1 “Feature Film Rating Count at Least 25,000 Horror.” IMDb, IMDb.com, www.imdb.com/search/title?genres=horror&sort=user_rating,desc&title_type=feature&num_v otes=25000,&pf_rd_m=A2FGELUUNOQJNL&pf_rd_p=2406822102&pf_rd_r=1K2913Y7A 092HRKVRNN9&pf_rd_s=right-6&pf_rd_t=15506&pf_rd_i=top&ref_=chttp_gnr_12. Lennington 4 Mother, May I (Die)? The horror genre has also been maligned for its often intense and gruesome violence. However, it is the visceral nature of these films, which makes the experience of watching them powerful. Feelings of dread often linger long after the viewing has ended. However, these films can leave the audience with more than just an increased paranoia in the dark, as there are other more insidious concepts that can persist as well. Just as much as a film can condition an audience to fear a clown, the same film can also have the power to lead an audience to accept premises that have a greater impact on reality, such as perceived gender norms. Throughout the research for this thesis, four subcategories of mother became manifest; firstly, there is the Domestic Mother (The Others, Mother!). She exists mainly within the context of her home and family. She is never (or rarely) shown to leave the house. The critique of the quality of portrayal of this subtype of mother, depends on the quality of characterization. Often these mothers will fail to have conversations outside her family. If employment is established, it usually takes place within the home and she is the only one depicted performing chores. In these cases if there is a disturbance within the domestic sphere, she may be the first to notice, and will be frequently rebuffed by her husband when she brings up concerns. This first subcategory of mother adheres generally to traditionally idealized gender roles. The second subtype of mother is the Mentally Vulnerable Mother (Lights Out, The Babadook, Hereditary). Mothers who fall into this subcategory may have mental disorders, which act as a catalyst or doorway for evil. A mother in the Mentally Vulnerable category need not be diagnosed with a mental disorder; she simply has to have her mental vulnerabilities exploited for the purpose of horror. Oftentimes, if a mental disorder is present, it is poorly defined. This mother is often depicted taking medication, though it is often vague and is shown only to indicate the presence of a mental disorder without having to delve into medical exposition. However, the mother need not be on medication or even have indications of therapeutic treatment in order to fall into this category. Fitting into the mold of the Mentally Vulnerable Mother is also the grieving mother, who may or may not be shown to have received a diagnosis for her grief, but due to mental turmoil, she serves as a catalyst for horror (The Invitation, The Babadook). The mental disorder of a woman, particularly one who has given birth, has more power to it in these films, than the mental disorder of a man. It must be noted here that grief itself is not a mental disorder, but in the context of the Mentally Vulnerable mother, the grief has not been dealt with, and it has become a vector of
Lennington 5 Mother, May I (Die)? vulnerability. See the table below2 for further information regarding the definition of mental disorders used in this paper:
This table refers to “mental disorders” which will be the preferred term in this thesis, rather than “mental illness.” Grief is being included in this subtype for the purposes of this thesis, because despite it being not being a “disorder” it often manifests as such when not dealt with in a healthy manner (The Babadook) which makes it a vulnerability to be exploited. Further, there is literature to support the concept of prolonged grief as a disorder that will be later discussed. The third subtype of mother is the Heroic Mother (Orphan, Poltergeist). This mother will stop at nothing to save her children from a perceived threat. She will literally battle demons to save her children. In this case, the Heroic Mother has the strongest bond with her children, stronger than that even of the father. The husband either is absent or plays a less vital role in the rescue of the children. She can perceive when they are safe or in danger and she often is the only one who can save her children. The Heroic Mother can also be seen as a saintly symbol, who through her death drives the plot in significant ways (The Shallows, Get Out). The fourth subtype of mother is that of the Corrupting Mother (Carrie, Psycho, 1922). This version of motherhood manifests itself in different ways, but ultimately this woman has
2 Stein, D J et al. “What is a mental/psychiatric disorder? From DSM-IV to DSM-V” Psychological medicine vol. 40,11 (2010): 1759-65. Lennington 6 Mother, May I (Die)? birthed horror within the movie that could only stem from her role as mother and the way she fills it. Oftentimes the Corrupting mother has a connection with her children that goes too deep, beyond what is natural. However, instead of this giving her power to protect her children as it might for the Heroic Mother, it gives her power to act as an agent of horror. The corrupting mother, however, does not have to be fanatically devoted to her children in order to be a malevolent force. She may become corrupt in her inability to fulfil what a mother should be, at least in terms of what those in her family expect of her (1922). These four subtypes of mother shed light on the representation of family and women within the filmic horror genre. They often work as both positive and negative examples upholding the nuclear family as the ideal. Often the horror of a film will commence when the family structure is either disturbed or threatened, and different types of family structure influence the formation of types of mother identified above.
2 Motherhood
2.1 Recruiting Mothers
Before the discussion begins concerning the depiction of motherhood in horror films, motherhood itself must be examined. When Leta S. Hollingworth published her article, Social Devices for Impelling Women to Bear and Rear Children3 in 1916, she espoused views quite ahead of her time. In the article she seeks to describe, without sentiment, which social tools are utilized in compelling women to become mothers. She argues that the allure of motherhood is not a result of some powerful, intrinsic “maternal instinct” but rather the outcome of the orchestrated efforts of society. Though the article was written over a century ago, it remains remarkably relevant to the research of this thesis and to media as a whole. Hollingworth likens child bearing to military service in that both involve risk to life and limb, both involve sacrifice on behalf of the individuals involved and both are necessary for the continued existence of nations and societies. Therefore, both require a concerted effort to encourage recruitment.
3 Hollingworth, Leta S. “Social Devices for Impelling Women to Bear and Rear Children.” American Journal of Sociology, vol. 22, no. 1, 1916, pp. 19–29. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2763926. Lennington 7 Mother, May I (Die)? An important difference between mothers and soldiers is, as Hollingworth notes, that after a child is born it requires rearing. Whereas military service can be completed, a child requires many years before it can become independent. Even after independence is achieved, maternal involvement is still expected. Bearing and rearing children is a lifelong engagement. It is important to note that at the time Hollingworth wrote her argument, anxiety over declining birthrate was rampant. Women therefore have to be convinced to prefer domestic activities based on some sort of supposedly inherent drive, over the satisfaction of what Hollingworth refers to as, “vocational proclivities” (Hollingworth 20). This inherent drive, or “maternal instinct” is a powerful tool in recruiting women to motherhood, regardless of the possible negative outcomes. Hollingworth lays out her argument thusly: The facts, shorn of sentiment, then are: (1) the bearing and rearing of children is necessary for tribal or national existence and aggrandizement. (2) The bearing and rearing of children is painful, dangerous to life, and involves long years of exacting labor and self-sacrifice. (3) There is no verifiable evidence to show that a maternal instinct exists in women of such all- consuming strength and fervor as to impel them voluntarily to seek the pain, danger and exacting labor involved in maintaining a high birth rate (ibid., 20-21) It is therefore necessary for society to lead women to motherhood who might otherwise be inclined to pursue other avenues in life beyond the domestic sphere. She argues that society equates the “womanly” woman with the “normal” woman: “The medical profession insistently proclaims desire for numerous children as the criterion of normality for women, scornfully branding those so ill-advised to deny such desires as ‘abnormal’” (ibid., 22). She continues to say that, “No one wishes to be regarded by her fellow creatures as ‘abnormal’ or ‘decayed’” (ibid., 23). She asserts that without these societal pressures, the maternal instinct would be distributed exactly like other human traits, that is to say, according to probability. One must keep in mind the historical reality of the time in which Hollingworth is writing. The laws she refers to in her article are mostly gone today. Sterility was considered grounds for divorce and abortion was strictly punished. Of course, abortion is still a contentious topic to this day, and is illegal in many places and has significant barriers to access in others. Belief is another tool, which Hollingworth discusses. She mentions that among highly religious women of the Christian faith, the idea of limiting family is considered sinful. What Hollingworth writes about education is admittedly outdated and not relevant to motherhood in media. What Hollingworth writes about art is, however, particularly interesting:
Lennington 8 Mother, May I (Die)? In pursuing the mother-child theme through art one would not be led to suspect that society finds it necessary to make laws against contraconception, infanticide, abortion and infant desertion. Art holds up to view only the compensations of motherhood, leaving the other half of the theme in obscurity, and thus acting as a subtle ally of population (ibid., 26). Horror films undoubtedly do explore this “other half”. However, in exploring the abject side of motherhood, many horror films end up upholding motherhood as the natural order of things. The negative examples provided by such films as Psycho, or Carrie, could be read as simply serving as models of the consequences of “bad” parenting, thus upholding the ideal of “good” parenting. Hollingworth writes: One of the most effective ways of creating the desired illusion about any matter is by concealing and tabooing the mention of all the painful and disagreeable circumstances connected with it. Thus, there is a very stern social taboo on the conversation about the processes of birth. The utmost care is taken to conceal the agonies and risks of childbirth from the young (ibid., 26-27). This of course is no longer the case, especially in horror. Barbara Creed writes extensively about the abjection of childbirth in her book, The Monstrous Feminine. Hollingworth finishes her article by adding motherhood recruitment tools, which she noticed on her own. She calls these tools, “Bugaboos” (ibid., 29). These Bugaboos include the medical establishment frightening women away from waiting too long to have their first child, and creating the idea that an only child will grow up to be selfish and spoiled. Though many aspects of what Hollingworth discussed in her article have become outdated, the core of it remains highly relevant. Especially in understanding the depictions of women in media.
2.2 Psychoanalytic view
Karen Horney writes extensively about women in the book, Feminine Psychology4, which is a collection of articles she published. She did much of her writing in the 1920s and as a German scholar, she was heavily influenced by Freud. However, she has her own theories regarding women, pointing out flaws in his logic. About Psychoanalysis Horney writes: Psychoanalysis is the creation of a male genius, and almost all those who have developed his ideas have been men. It is only right and reasonable that they should evolve more
4 Horney, Karen, and Harold Kelman. Feminine Psychology. Edited and with an Introduction by Harold Kelman. Norton, 1967. Lennington 9 Mother, May I (Die)? easily a masculine psychology and understand more of the development of men than of women (Horney 54). This overwhelming control of men in the realm of psychoanalysis at the time of Horney’s writing is present today in the creation of horror films. Most of the films discussed in this thesis were written and directed by men. Therefore the women portrayed on screen are a man’s interpretation of a woman. Horney has an entire chapter entitled: Genesis of Castration Complex in Women (ibid., 37-52). She explains in depth possible sources for the Freudian concept of penis envy. For example, men simply have easier access to their genitals. Men see them every time they urinate (ibid., 40). Castration anxiety has played a large role in horror and will be discussed further with regard to Barbara Creed’s writing in The Monstrous Feminine. With regard to motherhood, Horney emphasizes the ambivalence women may feel. It is something to both fear and desire: The typical fears of early childhood with their transparent symbolism make it easy to guess at their hidden meaning. What else could be the meaning of the fear of burglars, snakes, wild animals, and thunderstorms, if not the feminine fear of overwhelming forces that can vanquish, penetrate and destroy? There are additional fears in connection with the early instinctive premonition of motherhood. The little girl is half afraid of experiencing this mysterious and dreadful event in the future and at the same time is half afraid she may never have the opportunity to experience it (ibid., 129). This passage from Problems of Marriage, speaks to the fear that many women had to deal with at the time and what they still deal with. Just as Hollingworth emphasized in her article, childbirth is dangerous. However, the threat of not having a child also provides a source of fear for many women. In the same article, she also makes note of how men may become jealous of their female partners with regard to their important role in child bearing. Just as the men of her time interpreted women through their biased internal frames, so too do the horror writers and directors of modern times see women through a masculine lense. As a result, women are placed into often incomplete roles to serve as plot devices and are in danger of lacking meaningful character development--particularly in the case of the Domestic Mother.
2.3 Postmodern Family
When speaking of mothers, the concept of family is impossible to ignore. In order for a horror film to be successful, the ability to feel sympathy or empathy for the characters portrayed onscreen is an important element. A family structure is an easy way to do this. Most people are familiar with the concept of a mother, father and children and what these roles signify, even Lennington 10 Mother, May I (Die)? though these roles can be hard to define in concrete terms. Many horror films, which involve a mother character, focus on a central family. However, as Trevor Noble notes in his article, The Nuclear Family and Postmodern Theory5, the definition and understanding of what exactly a nuclear family is has been in flux for some time. This has remained true in the years since 1995 when he published his article: If you define the normal nuclear family as a household comprising a married couple and their children then this merely confuses marriage as a cultural institution with the family unit as an element of structure. There have been changes in attitudes to marriage in recent years with the average age at entry, the relationship of marriage to enduring sexual relationships, the religious character, the indissolubility of the contract, the indispensability of the married state for adult status, all undergoing change. The statistical trends toward current diversity of patterns are not evidence of the disappearance of the nuclear family and its replacement with a postmodern family that might be. The increasing number of families at different stages of the family life cycle reflect changes in attitude to marriage and childbearing, and the increased divorce rate. They mostly reflect an increase in individualism—associated in the modernisation theory literature as a classic trait of modernisation and the move from traditional stem- family patterns to the nuclear pattern (Noble 131). Noble’s article speaks to the crisis of defining exactly what a family means and how it can vary wildly even within one society. This crisis has been reflected in media, and the horror genre is no exception. The horror films analyzed in this thesis actually seem to present a rather conservative view of the nuclear family. The central family is often not merely under threat from outside forces, but the very fabric of the family itself is under stress. The general accepted definition of a nuclear family according to Merriam-Webster6 is: “a family group that consists only of parents and children” (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nuclear%20family). This seems to be the definition which horror films strive to uphold. In fact, deviations from this concept are a frequent catalyst for horror in these films. For the sake of analysis, the nuclear family will be interpreted in the traditional sense. Taking this a step further, the nuclear family will be considered a mother and father and their children—as mentioned in the introduction, the films analyzed were overwhelmingly
5 Noble, Trevor. “THE NUCLEAR FAMILY AND POSTMODERN THEORY.” Hitotsubashi Journal of Social Studies, vol. 27, no. 2, 1995, pp. 127–143. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/43294397. 6 “Nuclear Family.” Merriam-Webster, Merriam-Webster, www.merriam- webster.com/dictionary/nuclear family. Lennington 11 Mother, May I (Die)? heteronormative. If the nuclear family is to be taken as the default, then any deviation from this template also creates a source of drama. For further sections of the thesis, the disturbed family structure will be examined. For example, in The Babadook, the familial structure has been disturbed by the tragic loss of Amelia’s husband. The roles of mother and son are filled, but the father role is empty which ultimately creates space for the Babadook to exist. In Carrie, the father is also absent, leaving both parental roles to be filled by Margaret White. Instead of the absent father leaving a hole in the narrative of Carrie, there is simply the impression that Carrie and her mother share a bond that could only exist between the two. The male presence was only necessary as a tool to bring Carrie into the world and thus create the mother-daughter dynamic that destroyed a town. Disruption in the family order can range anywhere from a child going away to college (What Lies Beneath) to the tragic loss of a child (The Babadook, The Descent, Orphan). In fact, the deviance in the nuclear familial structure has different ways of leading to the different subtypes of horror movie mother discussed earlier. The Domestic Mother may appear off kilter when her habits are interrupted, and when she starts to perceive unnatural phenomena she often goes ignored. In the case of the Mentally Vulnerable Mother, when the disruption occurs because of a death in the family, the loss can be a contributing factor for her vulnerability, or at least the worsening of her preexisting conditions (The Babadook, Hereditary). Mentally vulnerable mothers could be seen as a result of the crisis surrounding the postmodern nuclear family. When the family order of the Heroic Mother is disrupted, she gets her chance to save the missing or endangered family (The Orphan). It could be posited and will later be argued that many horror movies champion the nuclear family and show their disruption as something that results in horrific consequences. When the family of the Heroic Mother is disturbed or imperiled, she will fight ferociously to restore it. Her children take precedence and the movie will end happily as long as she manages to protect them, regardless of other losses, even including her partner. In terms of the Corrupting Mother, one need only look at Carrie to see that the lack of a father, or anyone else to bear witness for that matter, allows her to horrifically abuse her daughter for years. In instances where the family structure is intact, the family roles can become hyperbolized and therefore can be read as critiques on these roles in general. In The Shining, the overwhelming majority of the screen time is devoted to the Torrance family, completely isolated in the Overlook Hotel for the winter. There, without the benefit of society, they become each other’s only company. Their roles become magnified. Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) becomes Lennington 12 Mother, May I (Die)? an overbearingly intimidating father. Wendy becomes frightened and hysterical and does not fight her husband until the end of the film and Danny is the completely vulnerable child.
2.4 Barbara Creed on Monstrous Women
Another important text with regard to this thesis was The Monstrous Feminine7 by Barbara Creed.This book was, however, read not in print form, but as a Kindle ebook. Therefore the citations regarding this text involve not page numbers, but locations. The Monstrous Feminine examines females as the monsters in horror films. She says, “I will argue that when woman is represented as monstrous it is almost always in relation to her mothering and reproductive functions” (Creed 297). This will be referred to again in discussing the Corrupting Mother. As mentioned in the introduction to this thesis, the blurring of distinctions is important within the horror genre: “An individual who appears clean on the outside may be corrupt on the inside. The dichotomy of pure/impure is transformed into one of inside/outside, both forms of abjection exist within horror” (ibid., 1166). For Creed, this is embodied by the reproductive capabilities of the cisgendered woman. Women, when monstrous, are abject because of the inherent blurring of distinctions within their bodies. When interpreting Freud’s influential text concerning the Uncanny, she takes this concept of blurred distinctions further. She breaks down what he considered uncanny into three main categories: the double, castration and the notion of familiar and unfamiliar places (ibid., 1273). Taking this concept further: All of these fears are explored in the horror film. The horror presented within each category can be defined in relation to the loss of a clear boundaries. The double disturbs the boundary which establishes each human being as a discrete entity; castration fear plays on the collapse of gender boundaries and the uncanny feeling associated with a familiar/unfamiliar place disturbs the boundary which marks out the known and the knowable (ibid., 1285). Creed focuses mainly on the monstrous woman, but these very same concepts which may lead a woman to be frightening, also imbues her with the special abilities with regard to her to her children. The mysterious blurring of boundaries in a woman can make her almost magical as easily as they can turn her into an object of abjection.
7 Creed, Barbara. The Monstrous-Feminine: Film, Feminism, Psychoanalysis. ebook, Routledge, 1993. Lennington 13 Mother, May I (Die)? 3 Domestic Mother The quality of the portrayal of the domestic mother is important to analyze. Often mothers confined to the domestic sphere do not seem to have an existence outside of it. She may have no relationships outside of her family. This thesis Identifies two subtypes of Domestic Mother. First there is There is the Placeholder (Sinister, The Conjuring, Insidious). The Placeholder tends to exist because the plot calls for it. Maybe she needs to be there to witness the heroism of her husband; give her husband more to lose once horror commences; notice the haunting through the performance of her chores; or she is simply just there. The other subtype is The Meal. She is devoured by the domestic sphere and she highlights the confining nature of being a woman and keeping up a house.
3.1 The Placeholder Mother
This section will be brief, because there is not much to analyze in the Placeholder. She is the weakest in terms of characterization. In Sinister8, the occupation of the mother, Tracy (Juliet Rylance) is hardly addressed, although she is the one who leaves the house during the day while her husband, Ellison (Ethan Hawke) stays at home and works on a true crime book. When the mother is shown on screen, she is either being lied to or fighting with her husband (about children, his career and the new house). Notably, though the father stays at home, he is not depicted performing any chores. While his wife is shown to prepare meals and perform other household tasks. Tracy has no backstory. The only information revealed about her outside of the fact that she is Ellison’s wife and the mother of her children, is that she has a sister (with a house where she threatens to take the children should anything go wrong in the marriage). Apart from this tidbit, she has a British accent; however, none of her backstory is addressed. Though the father is placed originally in what could be perceived as the homemaker’s role, as the parent who spends the most time at home, it quickly becomes clear that he is still the traditionally masculine leader of the family. Despite being the first to perceive of the haunting, he adamantly keeps his family in the house, despite protests from Tracy, who does not know that the supernatural activity is taking place, she is only attuned to the increasingly troubling behavior displayed by her children. Moreover, although Ellison knows about the supernatural and increasingly demonic goings-on within the house, he does not attempt to flee it, but rather use it to solve a mystery. Once he decides to leave the house, it is too late. His family is doomed.
8 Derrickson, Scott, et al. Sinister. Summit Entertainment, 2012. Lennington 14 Mother, May I (Die)? Other examples of the Domestic Mother who don’t exist beyond their role in the family include Renai Lambert and Carolyn Perron. Renai (Rose Byrne), the mother of a possessed boy in Insidious9 is often shown doing chores. In The Conjuring10 the mother has almost no real role, apart from serving as a vessel for possession. These three movies have something in common where the mother are shown almost exclusively within the context of her domestic responsibilities, meaning that when she speaks it is mostly about her family and her story is not shown in terms of what she does outside of the house. The mothers discussed in this short section are as much a part of the domestic sphere as walls are. Thye are needed and sometimes interesting.However,one takes them for granted.
3.2 The Mother Meal
As stated at the beginning of the chapter, these mothers are devoured by the domestic sphere. In contrast to the Placeholder, who may be lost in the household, the Meal falls victim to it.
3.2.1 The Others
The Others11 opens with Grace (Nicole Kidman) screaming in bed as she wakes up from what was presumably a particularly bad nightmare. Outside three people are laughing as they approach the house. They knock at the door and Grace answers. She makes a comment about the visitors having arrived sooner than she expected. A kindly looking, elderly woman introduces the trio. Her name is Bertha Mills (Fionnula Flanagan), the old man’s name is Mr. Tuttle (Eric Sykes) and the young woman in their company is Lydia (Elaine Cassidy). Mrs. Mills explains that Lydia is mute. Grace barely speaks above a whisper as she begins authoritatively informing them about the house. Her previous servants left suddenly the week prior without even collecting their wages. Because of this, Grace put out an ad in the paper, looking for new help. Grace assigns the servants areas where they can live and proceeds to explain the strict rules of the house. She tells them exactly when meals need to be prepared and that upon entering any room, the door has to be locked behind them. As Grace is showing them the kitchen, Mrs. Mills asks about Grace’s husband. Grace suddenly become stiff and emotional. She informs them that there has been no news of him since the war ended. He is presumed dead. After the
9 Wan, James, director. Insidious. Blumhouse Productions, 2010. 10 Wan, James, director. The Conjuring. Warner Bros. Pictures, 2013 11 Amenábar, Alejandro, director. The Others. Dimension Films, 2001. Lennington 15 Mother, May I (Die)? moment of vulnerability, Grace is back to her professional tone, asking the new servants about who among them cooks. The house is large. There is a music room where no one is allowed to play the piano because it can trigger a migraine in Grace. She insists that she must show them the entire house because most of her time is spent indoors and the running of the house is very important. When it comes time to meet the children, Grace instructs Mrs. Mills and Lydia to shut the curtains. Grace lights a Gaslamp and leads them down a dark hallway. She rouses her children from their sleep and introduces them as Anne (Alakina Mann), and Nicholas (James Bentley). Anne is the older child. She explains that her children are extremely photosensitive and upon exposure to light, they will blister and eventually suffocate. The doctors have been unable to find a cure, so the children can only handle dim light. Mrs. Mills introduces herself as their new nanny. Grace has already eaten so she is absent as the kids eat their breakfast with Mrs. Mills. The kids discuss their father, both of them believing that he will be coming back. Anne asks Mrs. Mills if she will be leaving them. When Mrs. Mills assures her that she won’t be, Anne informs her that is what the previous servants had said. But then they did and “it” happened. Nicholas becomes tense at this point and tells his sister to be quiet. Mrs. Mills enquiries as to the “it” that Anne is referring to. Anne explains that their mother “went mad”. Nicholas vehemently denies this. Grace enters the kitchen and tells her kids to finish eating. She brings Mrs. Mills to another room, wishing to have a discussion with her. Grace is suspicious because she realized that the postman never came and therefore her ad could not have made it to the paper. Mrs. Mills reassures her, saying that she, Lydia and Mr. Tuttle were only stopping by on the off chance that such a big house was in need of extra help. She explains that the three of them actually used to work there. This comforts Grace. About the house, she says, “It is rather difficult to say the least. One might almost say, ‘unbearable’” (ibid). She explains that the only way to shoulder the burden is to keep a level head. She then goes on to talk about her children’s fantasies and how she does not want Mrs. Mills entertaining any strange stories or ideas that the children might have. Later, Grace sits with her children at a table. The room is dark and they are reading from an illustrated Bible. After a while, she separates the children and bids them to finish their lessons alone. Nicholas does not like being alone and has a fear of ghosts, which his sister seems to encourage, despite denying this fact to her mother. Nicholas asks for a kiss from his mother before she leaves. Anne makes fun of her brother for this, and after Grace sends Anne to the music room to study, she returns to her son. She explains to him that she can’t be there for him Lennington 16 Mother, May I (Die)? forever and tells him to squeeze his Rosary and say a prayer if ever he should be overcome by fear. The lesson that the children are reading is about the family, and the various roles each member is supposed to fill. Grace speaks briefly to Mrs. Mills, asking questions about herself. Mrs. Mills excuses herself and Grace is left alone. She hugs herself and checks her watch, but suddenly hears crying. Assuming that it is Nicholas, she rushes unlocking door to get to him. She discovers him, perfectly calm, reading his lesson. Grace then turns her attention to Anne in the music room. She finds her daughter similarly calm. She tells her daughter that there is nothing to be ashamed of if she was crying, but the girl insists that she was not. The child making a fuss, she explains, is Victor. Anne explains that Victor told her that she and her family would have to leave the house and that the boy’s father is a pianist. Victor is unhappy having to stay there. Grace does not believe her daughter and chides her for lying. She asks how a boy could have gotten into the locked room, but upon turning around to look, she notices that the door to the hallway is ajar. Immediately Grace blames the servants. She impresses upon them that her children’s lives depend on the light in the house remaining contained. Mrs. Mills explains that none of servants left it open and Grace becomes even more irate, believing that the implication is that she could have been the one to put her daughter at risk. The servants simply exchange a look. The Children eat at separate times as their mother. That night, over dinner, Nicholas asks his older sister if she actually saw a boy. He asks fearfully if it was a ghost. Anne denies this. She explains that ghosts move around in sheets and insists that she has seen them. This terrifies Nicholas and he refuses to admit that he believes his sister. Later in bed, Anne rouses her brother to prove to him that Victor is real. Victor has been opening the curtains when Anne closes them. She tells Victor to stop hiding and show himself to her brother. Nicholas is terrified and hides under his blankets. Anne tells Victor to touch her brother’s cheek. A hand is seen, and when it makes contact with Victor’s cheek, he immediately starts wailing for his mother. Grace rushes to comfort her son. Anne is punished and made to read the Bible aloud. When her mother tells her that she must ask the Virgin for forgiveness however, Anne refuses. She will not ask forgiveness when she has done nothing that needed forgiving. Grace tells her daughter that lying children go to Limbo, but Anne defiantly corrects her, saying that only unbaptized children end up there. Grace still believes that her daughter is lying and the punishment stretches out to three days. When discussing this punishment with Mrs. Mills Grace explains that it’s good to have Anne reading directly from the Bible now that she is old enough, especially given the fact that the priest hasn’t visited them in a while. Grace comments that she is beginning to feel isolated from the world. Lennington 17 Mother, May I (Die)? Even the birds have gone quiet. Before Mrs. Mills leaves to go about doing other chores, Grace informs her that she needs to tell Lydia to go about her chores more quietly. Apparently, the young woman has been making many noises and Grace fears this will lead to another migraine attack. When Mrs. Mills leaves, Grace immediately hears loud footsteps coming from above. They continue until she gets up from her chair to yell for Lydia to be quiet. Then Grace looks outside the window and sees Mrs. Mills and Lydia talking in the garden. There is no one who should be able to be making that noise. Grace goes out into the hallway where her daughter sits on the stairs, still reading aloud from her Bible. Grace asks her daughter to tell her what is going on and her daughter informs here that there are people in the junk room at the top of the stairs. Grace goes to investigate the room and sees the door outlined with light. She enters the room and finds it empty, save for furniture covered in sheets. She hears whispers around her and becomes frightened. She hears the door close and runs out of the room, asking her daughter if she saw people going anywhere. Anne explains that there are people all over and they are going to take the curtains away. Grace is shaken by this and speaks with Mrs. Mills. Mrs. Mills tells her to calm down but Grace refuses. She managed to keep Nazis out of her house throughout the whole occupation. Nicholas is clinging fearfully to Mrs. Mill’s skirt, but Anne calls for her mother’s attention. She has drawn a picture of the people in the house. There is a man, woman, boy and old woman. Each figure has a number next to it, which corresponds to the number of times Anne has seen each person. She has seen the old woman the most. Grace orders Mrs. Mills to retrieve Tuttle from the garden because they must search the house before it gets dark. Grace arms the servants with rifles and they proceed to comb the house for uninvited people. Mrs. Mills stays behind and watches the children. Anne and Nicholas both express doubts about the unquestionable veracity of the Bible; however they have not shared these doubts with their mother. During the search, Grace finds an old photo album in a disused room. She flips through photos of people who appear to be sleeping. Mrs. Mills enters the room to inform Grace that no one was found. Grace shows the photo album to Mrs. Mills and Mrs. Mills informs her that the people in the photographs are not sleeping, but dead. Grace is disturbed by this, but Mrs. Mills just says that grief can cause people to ask strangely. Grace bids Mrs. Mills to dispose of the book, as she does not want such a thing in the house. Mrs. Mills and Grace speak by the fire after the children have gone to bed. Mrs. Mills reveals that she used to be in charge of all the servants in the house and that the previous family treated her very well. She, Lydia and Mr. Tuttle were forced to leave when the island was evacuated due to a tuberculosis outbreak. Lennington 18 Mother, May I (Die)? Grace goes into the room of her sleeping children. She kisses Anne and cuddles her. She apologizes for not believing her, but Anne pretends to be asleep—implying a distrust in her mother. Nicholas wakes up however, and asks when his father will finally return home from the war. Despite being all but certain that her husband is dead, Grace simply tells her son that she does not know. She has not even informed her children that the war is over. The isolation is so complete that she manages to keep news as big as this secret from her children without difficulty. Grace retreats to her room where she cries in front of her wardrobe. She stops when she hears piano music. Upon investigating, she finds that the music room is empty. She locks the piano and looks around the room. She leaves the room and the door slams in her face. She attempts to open it only to find that it has locked. She runs frantically into the kitchen and gets Mrs. Mills’s set of keys. She lets herself back into the music room and discovers it empty again, however the piano cover is open. Mrs. Mills attempts to calm her by giving her some tablets and water. Grace admits to Mrs. Mills that she believes that there is an inhuman presence in the house. Mrs. Mills informs Grace that she does believe in things such as ghosts. Grace is terrified and has trouble understanding why the Lord would allow it. Grace decides that she must go into the village and bring the priest back to bless the house. Mrs. Mills tries to talk her out of it, citing the fog as a reason not to go. Nevertheless, Grace is determined. On her way out she instructs Mr. Tuttle to search the grounds for gravestones, particularly one belonging to a boy named Victor. After Grace has left and is out of earshot. Mr. Tuttle asks Mrs. Mills if it is dangerous for Grace to go get the priest. Mrs. Mills says that there is no way that she will make it to town in the fog. Mr. Tuttle asks when they should, “bring this all out into the open” (ibid). Mrs. Mills just says they need to wait until the right time. The pair then notice that there is a gravestone peeking out of the pile of leaves that Mr. Tuttle had been raking. He quickly covers it. There is something comical, rather than foreboding about the tone of this scene. On the way to the village, the fog does indeed disorient Grace. She however, does find her husband, Charles (Christopher Eccleston) also wandering about in the fog. She embraces him immediately. After some hesitation, he raises his arms to embrace her back. She says that she was told that there was no hope for his return. Grace completely forgets about her mission to go find the priest and instead returns home, clinging to her husband. Mrs. Mills seems surprised to see Grace come home with a man in tow. She introduces Charles and orders Mrs. Mills to prepare a bath, some clothes and some food for her husband. Charles wanders into his children’s room and wakes them up. Anne and Nicholas are overjoyed to see him and jump into his arms. Anne asks him if he killed anyone in the war. Just like Charles was recruited into the war, so was Grace recruited into motherhood. Lennington 19 Mother, May I (Die)? Charles does not join his family for lunch, choosing instead to lie in bed. Anne asks about the fate of people who die in war. Grace tells her that it depends on which side they were fighting for. Nicholas asks how one can tell which the right side is. Anne tells him such questions do not matter since he will never go to war. Nicholas replies that he will never go anywhere. Grace tells him that he is not missing anything and that his place is at home with loving parents. Grace immediately jumps back into the nuclear family role. She is so happy to be a part of the functioning whole again. When Anne mentions the intruders, Grace denies that there ever were any. Now that Charles is home, she does not want any more problems to exist he is finally back to fulfil his role as the protector of the house. Grace does not have to worry anymore. Anne is upset by this denial and commences to breathe heavily. This disturbs Grace who sends her to her room without dessert. Mrs. Mills intercept a tearful Anne in the hallway. Mrs. Mills comforts Anne by telling the child that she believes her. She continues to say that Grace is simply not ready to see the others, but once she does, everything will change. There is a cut to the three servants sitting around a small table in Mr. Tuttle’s garden house. Mrs. Mills explains with annoyance that Grace is acting as if nothing ever happened. She comments that Grace will be harder to convince than her children will. Mr. Tuttle asks if Charles suspects anything and Mrs. Mills expresses doubt as to whether or not he even knows where he is. Here again, there is the oddly comical tone. It comes from a sense that the three servants find the behavior of the family to be amusing. They clearly know more than Grace does, despite the fact that Grace clutches so tightly to control. In fact, Grace is so controlled that when she loses control it is significant. The fact that she started the movie screaming is quite telling. Her outbursts hint at her anxiety and buried knowledge that she is helpless. Back inside the house, Grace stands behind her daughter in a full-length mirror. Anne is trying on her Communion dress. Grace pulls the veil over her Anne’s head and informs her that she made it herself. Grace allows her daughter to wear the dress for a while, but insists that she has to take it off before dinner. Grace leaves the room to see her husband. She lies next to him in bed and sings to him for a while. Anne plays in front of the mirror, humming to herself and dancing. She starts to imitate a ghost, as with the veil she resembles the description she gave her brother. Eventually Grace returns to tell Anne to change. When she enters the room, she discovers an old woman in the dress speaking with her daughter’s voice. Grace attacks the woman, ripping at the veil and dress screaming that she is not her daughter. Grace tears the veil away and discovers that it is in fact her daughter. Mrs. Mills enters the room because she heard yelling. Anne jumps up and yells, “She won’t stop until she kills us” (ibid.).
Lennington 20 Mother, May I (Die)? Grace shaken by these events washes her face in the kitchen. Mrs. Mills enters and informs Grace that Anne has calmed down but insisted upon talking to her father. Mrs. Mills asks Grace what happened, and Grace explains, wondering what is wrong with her. Mrs. Mills tells her that she just needs to get some rest and leave the running of the house to the servants, commenting that they know what to do. Grace bristles at this. She doesn't like to relinquish control. Grace sees that Mrs. Mills has given her tablets to take with a glass of water. She asks suspiciously about what they are and Mrs. Mills informs her that the tablets are just the medication she always takes for her migraines. Grace dumps both the water and the pills down the sink once Mrs. Mills leaves the room. Grace returns to her bedroom, passing Anne along the way. Anne won’t look at her mother. When Grace enters, Charles is sitting on the bed staring out the window it is worth noting that it does not appear that Charles got up to open the curtains in the time it took for his daughter to leave and his wife to enter. Charles informs Grace that Anne has told him everything, not just about what just happened with the communion dress, but also about “what happened that day” (ibid.). At first, Grace denies knowing what he is talking about. But after some needling she confesses that she doesn’t know what came over her that day. The servants had left overnight without notice despite knowing that she could not leave the house. There is a cut to Anne and Nicholas sitting near each other in their room. Nicholas asks his sister what happened and Anne explains that Grace went mad, like “that day” (ibid). She asks Nicholas if he remembers, but he does not. The camera cuts back to the conversation between Grace and Charles. She asks him for forgiveness, but he just says she needs it from the children. He informs her that he only came back to say goodbye and that he must return to the war. Grace is distraught telling him that the war is over, but Charles disagrees. Grace becomes angry and wants to know why he left in the first place, because his place was at home with his family. She does not think he left because of the war. She tells him that in the dark prison of their home, he was enough for her to bear it. But she must have not been enough for him and that must have been why he left. Charles cries at this but does not disagree with her. He joins her in the bed and initiates sexual contact. After they are done, he simply stares at her while she sleeps in his embrace. The screen fades to black and he apologizes. When the picture returns, Grace is alone in bed. She walks out to the fence and stares forlornly from behind the bars. It’s an image that recalls the prison Grace had spoken of in just the scene before. Anne wakes up to discover that her room is flooded with sunlight. Her blood curdling scream sends Grace running back to the house. She discovers that the curtains in her children’s Lennington 21 Mother, May I (Die)? room have disappeared. Grace covers the children with her robe and she frantically looks for a dark place. She calls out for Mrs. Mills. It appears that all the curtains have been removed. Grace eventually finds a room with one window, in front of which she can place a chalkboard, effectively cutting off the light. Grace confronts her servants in the music room. Mrs. Mills and Mr. Tuttle are incredibly calm. They assure Grace that she does not have to be afraid. They have noticed the missing curtains. Mrs. Mills even comments that there is no way to be sure that the children are still vulnerable to the sunlight. Mr. Tuttle shares an anecdote about how his sister’s rheumatism simply cleared up one day. Grace informs the servants that they are dismissed once they have helped her find the curtains. She storms out into the hallway to retrieve her rifle from a locked chest. The trio of servants pop up behind her and Mrs. Mills calmly asks what Charles has to say about the situation. Grace forces Mrs. Mills to hand over her set of keys at gunpoint and tells them to leave right then. The juxtaposition of Grace’s panic with the nonchalance of the older servants is stark. The servants act as though they are dealing with an upset, but precocious child. Once outside, Mrs. Mills informs Mr. Tuttle that her patience has run out. Grace checks on her children. They ask for their father and Grace has to inform them that he has left. Nicholas embraces his mother, but Anne just stares angrily at her and demands that she find the curtains. Grace searches the house frantically for the curtains to no avail. She eventually makes her way to Mrs. Mills’s quarters. Instead of finding the missing curtains, she finds an old photograph of the trio of servants from 1890. It is another death portrait. She runs to find her children. During the search, however, the children had climbed out of the window with the intention of finding their father. As Grace was discovering the photograph, they stumbled upon the gravestones Mr. Tuttle had covered up earlier. As Grace sprints onto the lawn to find her children, the three servants are already advancing on the children. Grace urges her children inside and tells them to go hide. She locks the door but has no trouble hearing Mrs. Mills as she tells her that the living and the dead have to find a way to coexist and that she had tried to explain what was happening but Grace wasn’t ready to hear it. The three servants died during the tuberculosis outbreak. Grace begs them to leave, but Mrs. Mills informs her that the intruders have already taken hold of her children and that she has to go address them. Grace runs into the room where her children are and discovers a séance underway. Victor’s parents are there. The old woman is leading it, asking her children questions. She writes on a piece of paper, which a man next to her consults and reads to the people gathered around the table. He is just repeating what the children are saying. The old woman asks the children about what happened in that room and Anne whispers in her ear. Now it is revealed what Lennington 22 Mother, May I (Die)? happened on “that day”. Grace smothered her two children and then shot herself. Grace and her children start chanting that they are not dead. Grace rips up the paper on the table. Victor’s mother insists to her husband that they have to leave and the husband relents, agreeing to leave in the morning. The camera cuts to Grace sitting on the floor in the hallway. She has a child tucked under each arm. They are nestled into her, seeking comfort. She explains what happened the day she went mad: At first I couldn’t understand what the pillow was doing in my hand. Why you didn’t move. But then I knew. It had happened. I killed my children. I got the rifle. I put it to my forehead and I pulled the trigger. Nothing. Then I heard your laughter in your bedroom. You were playing with the pillows as if nothing had happened. And I thought, The Lord in his great mercy is giving me another chance. Telling me: don’t give up. Be strong. Be a good mother. For them (ibid.). Nicholas asks his mother where they are and Mrs. Mills interjects, walking out from the kitchen. Apparently that was the first thing Lydia had said after dying from tuberculosis and she never spoke again after that. Mrs. Mills offers to make some tea. She says that even though the intruders are leaving, there will be others. Due to the nature of things, there will be times that they notice and others when they do not. Mrs. Mills retreats into the kitchen. Nicholas asks his mother if his father died in the war, Grace confirms this but is unsure of whether they will ever see them again. Grace again expresses doubt about the existence of Limbo or anything she believed. She tells her children that she knows no more than they do. There are only a few things of which she is certain. She has always loved her children, will always continue to do so and that the house is theirs. The three of them begin to chant, “This house is ours” (ibid.), repeatedly. It echoes in the rooms and the empty hallways. Anne plays and twirls in the sun coming from a window, wondering at the fact that it does not hurt. Nicholas hesitantly joins her. Grace stands between them with her arms around them. They stare out of the window onto the lawn where the living family is packing up their car. Grace claims ownership over the house again. The family drive away from the house. A man closes the gate behind the family and a for-sale sign is revealed.
3.2.1.2 Discussion of The Others
Despite the fact that Grace murdered her children, they ultimately trust her. In fact once they all realize that they are dead, the family seems even closer after this revelation. The house acts as an anchor. They will live forever in this never-ending domestic sphere. In a way, the
Lennington 23 Mother, May I (Die)? transition into death is a rebirth for all three. Anne and Nicholas no longer need to fear the sun. Grace no longer has any pretense of control and is therefore free. Similarly to Hollingworth’s article, it appears that Grace was recruited into domesticity while her husband volunteered for his war. She has a serious medical concern of her own in her migraines and adding to that the extra domestic stress of having children with a life threatening condition—it was not a sacrifice, which Grace was able to make. The fact that the children are reading about the family in their lessons at the beginning of the film is thematically important. Grace believes what she is supposed to believe. As such, she believes that she has be the mother in control of everything. However, she became too rigid. The fact that the audience is first introduced to Grace by her screaming is a foreboding detail.
3.2.2 Mother!
Darren Aronofsky's 2017 film, Mother!12 is a highly symbolic film. No character in the film is given a name. They are simply credited as Him (Javier Bardem), Mother (Jennifer Lawrence), Man (Ed Harris), Woman (Michelle Pfeiffer), and so on. The film is hard to place into a specific subgenre of horror. It could be described as a home invasion film with elements of swarming, brainless zombie hordes—not the zombies themselves, but in the sense of overwhelming masses and cannibalism. These “names” seem to allow for a lack of personal identity regarding the characters. They create allegorical roles, which could be filled with a series of like players, rather than specific individuals who might be confined to a specific time and place. The film opens with a black screen and the sound of flames. A young woman’s face is shown as she is engulfed in fire, her face is calm and a single tear escapes as the flames obscure her face. The title screen is shown and then the audience sees dirty hands, belonging to Him, place a crystal lovingly onto a stand. Then the crystal seems to repair the damage of a burned out husk of a house. Mother is shown waking up alone in bed. The sequence of opening events in this film is important, and will be revisited toward the end of the analysis of this chapter. The age difference between Him and Mother is also of important note. At the time of filming, Jennifer Lawrence was twenty-seven and Javier Bardem was fifty-eight. Large age gaps between men and women portrayed in romantic relationships are nothing new to Hollywood films, but the difference here is relevant to the plot, and will be discussed further shortly. Mother and Him live in a large but isolated home with no visible roads leading to the house. Though Him works from home as a writer and both spend most of their time indoors,
12 Aronofsky, Darren, director. Mother!Paramount Pictures, 2017. Lennington 24 Mother, May I (Die)? Mother is shown to have the deepest connection to the domestic sphere. She is depicted taking care of the house, painting walls and cooking for her husband. Throughout the entire film she is barefoot. At the beginning of the film, she is not yet a mother. She wears pale colors, this combined with her youth gives the impression of purity. Him’s writings attract at first just one unwanted houseguest, Man, who is dying and wishes to meet the author who inspired him so. His wife, Woman, later joins Man, and this greatly upsets Mother, although Him is inspired by the company. Eventually the children of Man and Woman show up and one brother murders the other. Mother tries to clean the blood from the floor, but is never able to get the stain out. There is a gathering held at the house after the death of the one son and the mourners make a mess and damage items in the house. In Monstrous Feminine, Creed likens a house to a womb (Creed 1321). This house is something so personal to Mother and the disrespect of it is a violation of an incredibly intimate part of herself. After a fight Mother and Him have intercourse, something that had not happened in a long time. When Mother awakes the morning after, she informs Him that she is pregnant. She just instinctively knows this. He is subsequently struck by inspiration. He finishes his work when Mother is heavily pregnant, clearly within days of giving birth. He writes something so “good” that more people arrive at the house as though on a pilgrimage. Through an increasing amount of unwanted houseguests, Mother begins to feel panicked. The climax of the film begins calmly with a heavily pregnant Mother preparing a dinner for Him in order to celebrate the success of his new published work. Mother cleans herself and dons a pale gray dress. She cooks a large meal involving several courses and sets a beautiful table. Despite the entire disregard that her husband has shown for her wishes, she remains devoted to her husband. Houseguests, clamoring to meet the author and see where he lives, of course, interrupt the dinner. Him welcomes the guests while Mother wants them to leave. There is a mob forming outside and, despite her efforts, Mother can’t keep them out of the house. It is here where the film becomes akin to one belonging to the zombie subgenre of horror. The mob is mindless and destructive and force their way into the house, with no regard for its contents. Eventually mother is confined to a room on the second floor of the house as she is about to give birth. Him joins her. The birth of the child is perhaps the most surprising part of the film, as it is incredibly sterile. There is no afterbirth, no blood visible on Mother’s dress. There is simply screaming and then a child. This stands in stark contrast to the rest of the film, which does not shy away from disturbing imagery, both before and after this point. The sterility of this birth is the key to understanding Mother as a character in this highly symbolic film. Creed states, regarding the horror of birth: “Her ability to give birth links her directly to the animal world and to the great cycle of birth, decay and death. Awareness of his Lennington 25 Mother, May I (Die)? links to nature reminds man of his mortality and the fragility of the symbolic order” (Creed 1137). Mother’s birth scene, in its sterility, sets her apart from this cycle. She is not linked to decay and death. Moreover, she is no reminder for Him of his death. After giving birth to the baby, Mother refuses to leave the room. The couple accept offerings left outside the door. Mother will not let Him hold the baby. They stare at each other and Mother fights the urge to fall asleep. Eventually she succumbs to sleep and wakes up to find both her husband and baby gone. She frantically goes out into the mob. Him has presented the baby to the mob of people and they lift up the baby through the crowd, each person trying to touch what Him has created. There is a sickening noise and the baby is killed. What follows is an incredibly bloody sequence of events. The mob is literally devouring the baby. Mother fights her way to the mangled mass of blood and viscera that moments previous had been her newborn. She lashes out, attacks people in the mob and is beaten up by those nearest to her as they call her gender-based insults and tear at her clothing. Mother manages to pick up a lighter and fights her way eventually to the basement where she sets up an explosion using the gas tank located there. Much like the opening sequence of the film, the audience watches her face as she burns up. Finally, the house is empty. Him carries Mother up the stairs, and somehow she is not dead yet, She consents to give him her heart and he reaches into her chest and removes a crystal identical to the one seen at the beginning of the film. He then places the new crystal on the stand and the house is made whole again. The film ends with a new young woman waking up alone in the bed.
3.2.4 Discussion of Mother!
Mother! is an important film in the context of this analysis as it offers a stripped down dynamic that one often sees in horror films. The mother in this film is literally only known as Mother. She has no name, no backstory. She is supportive of her husband even when it comes at great cost to her. The only time that she firmly takes a stand against him is when she is attempting to protect her child. In the end however, even after her child has been devoured before her eyes, Mother’s heart still belongs to Him. Her womb has symbolically been destroyed, both by the loss of her child and the utter destruction of the house. However, the cyclical nature of the film implies that the womb regenerates and that Him thrives on this cycle of birth and destruction. In this film, it is the man, Him, who is the abject. In Problems of Marriage, Horney speaks to an interesting dichotomy regarding how a woman is seen as better when she is virginal, but cannot both be a mother and a virgin: “Thus they appear either as heroes or monsters” (Horney 128). This is the crux of the character of
Lennington 26 Mother, May I (Die)? Mother. In this case, it is Him who is the monster. Mother is a tragic hero. She possesses all of the qualities of an ideal woman , wife and mother. Creed writes, “Woman’s reproductive functions place her on the side of nature rather than the symbolic order. In this way the woman is again linked to the abject through her body” (Creed 1149) This is contradicted in Mother!. The birth scene is clean, there is no afterbirth or gore, Mother has to remain virginal and clean looking, despite the gore and disturbing imagery that permeates the rest of the film. Perhaps the most obvious allusion the film makes is to the Bible. Although Mother does not give virgin birth, it wasn’t an abject one. Him hands his son off to the masses, only for the baby to be killed. However the film offers no real atonement. Mother destroys the hordes of unwelcome guests in her home with fire, which restarts a cycle of what seems to be the same thing happening. Him has no connection himself to death. He simply relives his own cycle of creation and destruction.
4 Mentally Vulnerable Mothers
4.1 Understanding Grief
In understanding the Mentally Vulnerable Mother, it is important to understand the concept of prolonged grief first. Although not every mother with a mental disorder in a horror film will suffer from grief, the texts, which will be discussed shortly, also apply to the treatment and diagnosis of other mental disorders. It is important to note that in order grief to be considered a mental disorder, symptoms have to persist more than 6 months. As Richard P. Goldstein says in Parental Grief13, “Grief is the emotional adaptation to loss and the way it is expressed” (Goldstein 144). Grief is a normal process and is to be expected after the loss of a loved one. However, when the symptoms of grief continue far beyond what is normal, it becomes known as “prolonged” or “complicated” grief. The symptoms do not improve with time. According to Goldstein: Prolonged grief disorder is a diagnosis used for bereaved persons who are abnormally affected… Its criteria require that the grief lasts for a period longer than six months after a significant loss, along with clinically significant impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning. Separation distress must be present, manifest as yearning and physical or emotional suffering on a daily basis or to a disabling degree. In addition, at least five cognitive, emotional or behavioral symptoms must be present daily
13 Goldstein, Richard D. “Parental Grief.” SIDS Sudden Infant and Early Childhood Death: The Past, the Present and the Future, 2018, pp. 143–154. Jstor, doi:10.20851/sids-08. Lennington 27 Mother, May I (Die)? or to a disabling degree. These symptoms include role confusion or a diminished sense of self; difficulty accepting the loss; avoidance of reminders of the deceased; loss of trust; anger, difficulty ‘moving on’; emotional numbness; feeling that life is empty, meaningless or unfulfilling; feeling stunned, dazed or shocked by the loss. (Goldstein 147-148). As will become apparent in this chapter, this description of Prolonged Grief fits the characterization of the central mother figure in The Babadook. However, aspects of it are present in the other mothers too. Goldstein’s article focuses on the grief of parents after the loss of a child. According to the article, parents tend to suffer grief more acutely than those who have lost a different type of loved one. Another relevant text on grief, Helping Loss Survivors Grieve14 is a literature review on complicated grief. It particularly focuses on veterans and those who have lost loved ones suddenly to suicide. This literature review suggests that is hard to prevent complicated grief, but treatment is necessary in improving symptoms once they have set in. In fact, all credible research on the treatment of mental disorders will involve suggestions for treatment. Ignoring a problem is not conducive to that problem being solved. Treatment involves first admitting that treatment is necessary and then either seeking it out or accepting it. Important in this concept is communication. There needs to be support. Sometimes the Mother with Mental Vulnerability in a horror film will have her disorder under control. It is not uncommon in general for a horror movie character to be depicted as taking unspecified prescription pills (Orphan, Hereditary). Showing this on screen is a way to insert into the narrative that the character is suffering from mental disorder without having to delve into exposition regarding their psychiatric past.
4.2 Overview of the Mentally Vulnerable Mother
The Mentally Vulnerable Mother encompasses mothers who have actual mental disorders or mothers who are simply not in peak mental health—regardless of whether they have received any real diagnosis. The mental vulnerabilities of the mother in this category are exploited and allow horror to take place in a film. Having a mere disorder is not enough to place a woman into this category, rather the mental vulnerability must play an active role in allowing the onscreen horror to happen.
14 Ramchand, Rajeev. Suicide Postvention in the Department of Defense: Evidence, Policies and Procedures, and Perspectives of Loss Survivors. RAND, 2015. Read chapter: Helping Loss Survivors Grieve Lennington 28 Mother, May I (Die)? The Invitation15 directed by Karyn Kusama provides an example of a mother whose mental vulnerabilities leave her open to being inducted into a cult. A year after losing a child a woman invites her friends together for a dinner party, which actually turns out to be a chance to poison all of her loved ones in order for them all to find peace together. The father of the dead boy, her ex-husband is also there, and although he is sad he appears to be much more stable than she is. She is so distraught by the loss of her son that she had to turn to the cult in order to cut off all emotions surrounding the incident. The grief of the mother is powerful enough to emanate around her and put others at risk.
4.2.1 The Babadook
One of the few movies directed by women discussed in this thesis is the 2014 film The Babadook16, written and directed by Jennifer Kent. The film is set in Australia and follows a widowed mother Amelia (Essie Davis) and her son, Samuel (Noah Wiseman). The film opens with Amelia having a nightmare about the car crash that killed her husband, Oskar, as they were driving to the hospital where Amelia would give birth to her son. During this nightmare, Samuel, who complains that he had a nightmare, awakes Amelia. He clings to her as she checks his closet and under his bed. She reads him a story and allows him to sleep in her bed. As the boy sleeps, he clutches his mother’s neck tightly, grinds his teeth and kicks his feet. Amelia distances herself from the sleeping boy, cutting off physical contact. This is important as it establishes Amelia as a mother uncomfortable with her child. She craves distance from him. Samuel wakes before Amelia does and as Amelia is coming down the stairs she sees that her son is about to fire a ball from a homemade weapon. She begs him not to fire it, but her wishes go unheeded and the boy ends up breaking a window. Amelia, instead of becoming particularly angry is just hopeless. As she helps her son get ready for school he tries to get her attention so that she can watch him perform a magic trick. Amelia is distracted and only reluctantly looks up. Samuel then affectionately caresses her face, which Amelia accepts with a weary smile. He then embraces her tightly and she snaps at him not to do that. Again there is the evidence that Amelia is uncomfortable with physical contact with the boy. The physical contact itself, which he always initiates, seems uncomfortable. He squeezes too tightly, as though already anticipating being brushed off by his mother.
15 Kusama, Karyn, director. The Invitation. Drafthouse Films, 2015. 16 Kent, Jennifer, director. The Babadook. Screen Australia, 2014. Lennington 29 Mother, May I (Die)? Even within these opening minutes of the film, the dynamic between Amelia and her son is well established. She is not quite comfortable with her son, who seems to be a loud and abrasive child. He, in turn, is aggressive in his need for physical affection and attention. Amelia, however, does care for her son. After abruptly ending the embrace, she smiles conciliatorily and continues to assist her son in getting ready. She drops the boy off at school and heads off to her job where she works at an elderly care facility. She has a colleague at work with whom she shares a flirtatious relationship. Her workday is interrupted when Samuel’s school calls. It turns out that he brought the homemade weapon to school. She has to meet with people at the school. It is established that this is not the first trouble that her son has caused at the school. He has been sent to the school counselor, and the school officials want a monitor to follow her son around and keep him separate from the other children. Despite the coldness that Amelia has shown toward her son from the outset of the film, she passionately defends her son. She claims that her son does not need constant surveillance from a monitor, instead saying that what he needs is understanding. She then declares that she will be taking her son out this school and sending him instead to one that, “Sees my son as a human being and not just another problem to be gotten rid of” (ibid.) This statement hints at a cognitive dissonance within Amelia herself. Her actions thus far in the film have been employed to distance herself from the boy physically. She even has trouble looking at him for too long and often averts her gaze. However, she does feel love for her son. Her probable depression resulting from the loss of her husband has clouded her ability to be the mother she wants to be. The way she presented herself in the school office is perhaps the type of mother Amelia wants to be. A mother who gives her son the understanding she says he needs. After the encounter in the school office, Amelia drives her son home, staring blankly at the road in front of her. She glances back at her son, who is uncharacteristically silent. In a careful tone, Amelia informs her son that they will be heading to the park to see his Aunt Claire and her daughter Ruby. The boy is not comforted. He stares out of his own window and laments that his teacher hates him. Samuel is not a boy who causes trouble out of maliciousness. He still wants to please the adults in his life. Amelia tells her son unconvincingly that his teacher does not hate him, but rather just needs a break from him. She then informs her son not to tell his aunt what happened when he sees her at the park, saying absentmindedly that she will inform her sister later. Before arriving at the park, Amelia and Samuel stop by the supermarket. As Amelia is checking out, Samuel is again begging for his mother’s attention as he plays with another little girl. Amelia ignores him until he ends up speaking candidly with the mother of the girl, Lennington 30 Mother, May I (Die)? informing her that his dad is dead. He casually states, “He got killed driving mum to the hospital to have me” (ibid.). The woman hurriedly leaves and again, Amelia just looks lost. At the park, Amelia and Claire talk, and Amelia is visibly bored with what her sister is saying until the conversation turns to the celebration of Ruby and Samuel’s birthday. Ruby was born around the same time as Samuel and they have always shared their birthdays. Claire informs Amelia that this year Ruby wants a princess theme and therefore wants the day to be just hers. Claire suggests that Amelia celebrate Samuel’s birthday on the actual day of the boy’s birth. This exchange implies that the death of her husband has more claim on that day than her son does. Further indicating that Amelia has not received the proper care in overcoming her grief. Again, Samuel screams for his mother’s attention but only manages to hold it for a moment. Amelia does not look at her son again until he has climbed up onto the top of a swing set and is standing precariously on the narrow bar. There is then a jump cut to Amelia and her son in the car on their way home. Samuel is wailing in the backseat as Amelia helplessly looks on. Amelia has no support with this difficult child. Her family was thrown off balance before it even began, with the death of her husband occurring within hours of the birth of her son. When the pair arrive home, a kindly older neighbor woman who is sitting on her porch greets them on the way in. Amelia displays the first signs of genuine warmth and affection of the film. She seems to like her neighbor and enthusiastically greets her dog when Samuel lets her out as he opens the front door. Immediately, Amelia embraces the dog, whom in this one interaction has received more affection from Amelia than her own son has. Amelia offers to take the rubbish out for her neighbor. Amelia enjoys a warm relationship with her flirtatious co worker and here with her elderly neighbor. This would indicate that she feels comfortable around people whom she does not directly associate with the loss of her husband. She either blames her son for the loss or simply cannot separate him from the memory of it. Amelia and Samuel have a silent dinner and again, Amelia is depicted having to check the closet and under the bed in her son’s room to reassure him that there is no monsters. She tells her son to pick a book for that night, and this is where the Babadook is introduced to the story. Samuel selects a hardcover book entitled, Mister Babadook. Amelia commences reading him the book before she realizes the disturbing contents. The story reads thusly (punctuation has been added in some cases because due to the formatting of the book not lending itself to direct transcription, however all the words remain unaltered): If it’s in a word or it’s in a look, you can’t get rid of the Babadook. If you’re a really clever one, and you know what it is to see, then you can make friends with a special one, Lennington 31 Mother, May I (Die)? a friend of you and me. His name is Mister Babadook. And this is his Book. A rumbling sound then 3 sharp knocks, ba Ba-ba Dook! Dook! Dook! That’s when you’ll know that he’s around. You’ll see him if you look. This is what he wears on top. He’s funny, don’t you think? See him in your room at night and you won’t sleep a wink” (ibid.). It is here where the story has gotten too disturbing and Amelia stops reading aloud. The last sentence is accompanied by a particularly sinister looking figure meant to be the Babadook, grinning and looming over the bed of a child with a speech bubble coming from him saying “let me in!”(ibid.). The story continues, although Amelia is reading silently now: “I’ll soon take off my funny disguise (take heed of what you’ve read…) and once you see what’s underneath… you’re going to wish you were dead” (ibid.). Mister Babadook is a popup book illustrated in black and white with exaggerated proportions. The Babadook is a domineering, angular figure with sharp teeth and fingers. He appears to be wearing a large coat, which obscures his figure, and a top hat. He had circular eyes and a large grin, and his proportions are unnatural. After Mister Babadook, Amelia has to read her son a soothing book as he sobs into her lap. She stays with the boy in his bed until he falls asleep, again clutching her in an uncomfortable looking manner. Once Samuel is asleep, Amelia tries to watch some television but all she sees is adult programming and a romantic movie playing. She goes upstairs to her room and attempts to pleasure herself with an adult toy. Of course, she is interrupted by her scared little boy and has to allow him to sleep in her bed. This scene hints at the desperate loneliness she feels. Her son, whom she associates with the death of her husband, robs her even of simulating the intimacy she could be sharing with a loving partner. It seems that nothing in her life is conducive to mental health. She has virtually no privacy, her elderly neighbor is her closest friend and she has trouble connecting with her son. Her son disturbs even the flirtatious relationship she has with her coworker, as she lies saying that her son is sick and he offers to cover her shift so that she may get some rest herself. The coworker shows up to the house with flowers and a present for the boy and realizes that he is not sick. Amelia is then forced to admit that her son was kicked out of his school so she had to lie because she has not found a suitable place for her son yet. Samuel frequently tries to assure his mother that he will protect her, when it is clear that Amelia really just wants protection from her son. Samuel is practicing magic in front of a picture of his parents in the basement in an important scene. The basement is usually kept locked. Amelia is angry because that is where she
Lennington 32 Mother, May I (Die)? keeps all of her late husband’s belongings. This is further evidence of her wanting to keep her son and husband separate. As Amelia cleans up the disarray in the basement caused by Samuel’s playing, she notices the first hint of the Babadook. Hanging on the wall is an outfit of a coat and pants, which are stiff, and in the posture of the Babadook. This is the first hint that the Babadook and the father are related. It is, after all a man’s outfit in the place where she keeps her husband’s belongings—this means that those are his clothes. The Babadook is the manifestation of her grief, and her son will not let her keep it locked away. It is after this moment that the movie creeps into the supernatural territory. That night at dinner, Amelia discovers glass in her soup. She dismisses her son as he insists that the Babadook did it. Later that night she goes up to her room to find it in disarray and finds that a picture of her and her late husband has been defiled. She blames her son, and her son immediately reaches for his homemade weapon, which Amelia snatches away from him. He then screams at her, “Do you want to die” (ibid.)? This is another instance of the son wanting to protect his mother. Traditional haunting events start to occur around the house, with the flickering of lights and Samuel actually seeing the Babadook. Furniture falls. Amelia encounters her son hiding underneath his bed after one of these such instances and he just yells: “Don’t let it in” (ibid.). repeatedly with his eyes wide. During this episode, Amelia finds the book again and proceeds to tear it apart and throw it away. Of course, the book warned in its opening lines that, “You can’t get rid of the Babadook.” Moreover, after the destruction of the book the strange phenomena around the house gets worse and Amelia’s mental state deteriorates. At Ruby’s birthday party, Samuel still attempts to cling to his mother. He is the only little boy there, although he has already been established to be an outsider independent of his gender. Through small talk with the other mothers at the birthday party, it is revealed that Amelia used to write children’s books. This further hints at the possibility that Amelia is behind her whole haunting, as every aspect of it seems to be directly tied to her, her grief and her past. Like her son, Amelia does not fit in well with her peers either. When one of the mothers at the birthday becomes condescending Amelia becomes rather hostile, embarrassing her sister. Later, Claire confronts Amelia about the outburst and Amelia defends herself saying that she finds it annoying that the other women feel sorry for her. Claire retorts by accusing Amelia of being unable to cope as soon as someone mentions her late husband, Oskar. Amelia says something very important during this interaction, which places her firmly into the category of Mother with Mental Illness: “I have moved on. I don’t mention him. I don’t talk about him. What strain is that on you, Claire?” What Amelia is describing there is not “moving on”. During
Lennington 33 Mother, May I (Die)? the confrontation between the sisters, it is revealed that Claire no longer comes around to Amelia’s house because she cannot stand being around Samuel. During this whole interaction, Samuel is hiding out in Ruby’s tree house, huddled in a corner as Ruby bullies him. When the little girl tells him that no one wants him, Samuel gets up and pushes the little girl out of the treehouse, which results in a bloody nose. On the way home from the party Samuel is again screaming repetitively. Amelia pulls over the car and asks her son, “why can’t you just be normal” (ibid.)? The boy then goes into a fit where he yells at an unseen presence (presumably the Babadook) to “get out.” He then goes silent and starts convulsing, prompting a visit to the hospital. There, it is determined that he is suffering from anxiety, and further treatment is recommended. Amelia asks the doctor for sedatives for the boy, just until the treatment starts. She admits to the doctor tearfully that she is not coping. Once home, she gives her son the pills and instructs him not to mention the Babadook again. She pushes her denial onto her son. The next morning, her son sleeps until past 11 AM, She seems to relish the quiet until she hears three knocks at her door and discovers the Mister Babadook book on her doorstep. The pages have been crudely pasted back together and this time the book is more sinister, including new text: “I’ll wager with you. I’ll make a bet. The more you deny me, the stronger I get” (ibid.). There are new pop up illustrations, this time presumably depicting Amelia herself. The Babadook hovers over her in bed, his mouth wide, again with the speech bubble demanding: “Let me in” (ibid.)! It continues, “You start to change when I get in, the BABADOOK growing right UNDER YOUR SKIN. OH COME Come see what’s UNDERNEATH” (ibid.)! As Amelia turns the pages, the popups depict her strangling her dog and then her son as the Babadook looms large behind her. The final popup depicts her slitting her own throat. She burns the book, and receives a call from her sister informing her that Ruby has broken her nose and is need of surgery. Amelia offers to pay and tries to tell her sister of the book, believing that she is being stalked. Claire is exasperated and just tells Amelia to go to the Police, which she does—but not before receiving a call where a grumbling voice simply says, “bababadookdookdook” (ibid.). Once at the station however, like so many other women in horror films, Amelia is not taken seriously. She gives up entirely when she looks at a coat hanging on the wall in the same posture of the Babadook from the book. Amelia is increasingly agitated. She snaps at her neighbor, who had been watching Samuel while Amelia was at the police station, for comparing Samuel to Oskar. Cockroaches begin pouring out of a hole in the wall behind the fridge. She is in the middle of cleaning her kitchen when some officials from the Department of Community Services show up to check on Lennington 34 Mother, May I (Die)? the welfare of Samuel, since he is not actually registered at any school. Her grief is not the only problem that she has trouble confronting. The officers leave concerned after talking to Samuel who informs them that he has been given drugs. Her son has a habit of speaking uncomfortable truths without hesitation and this creates a natural tension between mother and son. When Amelia has a nightmare in which the Babadook hovers over her and seems to breathe into her gaping mouth, she has finally begun to let the Babadook in. Where Amelia was rather short tempered with her son before, she becomes verbally abusive, telling her son to “eat shit” when he complains of being hungry. She immediately apologizes to her son, but whereas the boy was too clingy before he now recoils from the touch of his mother. She sees the Babadook everywhere and hears his gravelly voice. She starts taking on the stiff posture of the Babadook, she takes a bath with her clothes on. Her son is concerned. He expresses anxiety, fearing that she will leave him. He does not want them to spend the night in the house. He tries to call the neighbor asking if they can spend the night. Amelia becomes furious and cuts the phone lines. Samuel is aware that his mother has let the Babadook in. She hallucinates her son dead with a slit throat and when she snaps back to reality, she realizes that she is holding a knife. Amelia is flipping through television channels late at night. Nothing holds her attention until she sees a news report about a woman slitting the throat of her son only for his body to be found in the basement. The newscaster comments that the woman attacked police with the knife and was shot, it was the boy’s birthday and he had just turned 7. The camera zooms in on the window and Amelia can be seen smiling within, This is an important moment as Amelia keeps everything that she does not want to confront in the basement, and her own son is about to turn seven. Samuel stands behind her and tells her to wake up, she follows him into the basement after warning him that it is unsafe down there. Once Amelia descends the steps, Samuel is gone. The basement is well lit, in stark contrast to the lighting used in the rest of the house. She sees her deceased husband Oskar standing there, smiling at her. She immediately embraces and kisses him. Oskar says, “We can be together. You just need to bring me the boy” (ibid.). This is symbolic of the seductive nature of her grief. Here she is in the basement being held by the man whom she has symbolically tried to keep locked down there ever since her son came into the world. She has tried to keep the two most important male figures of her life separate, and now the Oskar is asking for the boy Amelia steps back. There is a part of her, it seems, that thinks to foster a connection between the dead man and the living boy could mean the end of both. Oskar turns sinister and Amelia runs from the basement. The Babadook emerges from the shadows and despite her trying to flee, gets to her. Amelia kills the dog, partially fulfilling the prophecy set forth by the book. She pulls a tooth from her mouth, indicating internal
Lennington 35 Mother, May I (Die)? rot (she had been depicted rubbing her jaw at several points throughout the film—just another problem that she does not deal with until the only solution is the most painful). She runs to her son’s room demanding to be let in. She breaks the door. She yells at the boy that it should have been he that died, not his father. Although she is clearly possessed at this point, her previous actions have implied that she truly would rather have her husband than her son. Her son attacks her with his homemade weapon. At this moment, the kindly neighbor arrives and professes her love for the mother and son. Upon being confronted by the neighbor, Amelia tries to soothe her son. She even tells him that they can spend the night at the neighbors. This is, however, a ploy to get physically closer to her son. She tells him that she wishes for him to meet his dad. Samuel then stabs his mother. He runs to the basement. Amelia pulls the knife out and follows him down. Samuel has set up a tripwire and she tumbles down the stairs. Samuel knocks her out and manages to constrain her with rope. It is here in the basement where Samuel is finally able to speak openly and maturely about his feelings He says, “I know you don’t love me. The Babadook won’t let you. But I love you, Mum. And I always will” (ibid.). It is through love that the Babadook is exorcised. It had to happen in the basement, because of the previously explained symbolic significance. Amelia is physically forced to confront her grief in that basement because of what she keeps down there. Grief is a common ailment. If one lives long enough, it is impossible to avoid. Therefore its treatment and symptoms are well documented within the mental health community. When one searches, “how to deal with grief,” on Google, the first result is a list from the National Health Society (NHS)17 website. The first item on that list, visible without even following the link, states: “Express yourself. Talking is often a good way to soothe painful emotions” (NHS). Instead of talking, Amelia literally vomits the darkness out of her. It has been held within her so long that when it comes out, it comes out like sickness. However, this wordless expression of release is enough. As Amelia and Samuel start to limp out of the basement, her son looks frightened once again as he tells her, “You can’t get rid of the Babadook” (The Babadook 2015). He is then dragged up the stairs by an unseen force Amelia manages to grab ahold of her son on a shaking bed. Amelia asks the Babadook what it wants. The shaking stops and Amelia sees her husband again and watches as the top half of his head slides off. This is the first time that the audience has seen what exactly the injury was that killed her husband. The corpse slides away into the growling darkness. Amelia says to this darkness: “You are nothing. You’re nothing. This is my house. You are trespassing in my house. If you touch my son again, I’ll fucking kill
17 “Dealing with Grief and Loss.” NHS Choices, NHS, www.nhs.uk/conditions/stress-anxiety- depression/dealing-with-grief-and-loss/. Lennington 36 Mother, May I (Die)? you” (ibid.). She is still trying to keep the grief away, but confronting it like this causes the Babadook to fall to the ground in a pile of clothes. She approaches it. There is a flash of bright light and the entity fleas to the basement. Amelia cradles her son and the danger has passed. It took this whole ordeal for her finally to be able to be the one who initiates contact with her son. The film seems to wrap up into an easy happy ending. Amelia sits comfortably with Samuel on a couch in her living room, chatting with the Public Service officials about the good school she found for her son. In the background, there is a “Happy Birthday” banner prominently displayed, one of the officials asks about this. Samuel says that this is the first time they have actually celebrated on the day. Instead of cringing as her son blurts out yet another uncomfortable truth, Amelia makes direct eye contact with the official and says, “My husband died the day that Sam was born” (ibid.). Samuel finishes the story explaining that he was killed on the way to the hospital as his mother was in labor. The officials look uncomfortable. Amelia simply smiles at her son and compares him favorably to his father as they both apparently shared the habit of speaking their mind. The way that this exchange takes place is significant. It shows that Amelia is finally able to talk about her dead husband; even comparing him to the son, she tried so hard to keep separate from him. Her son is now a part of her support system. Before the party begins, Amelia and her son are in the garden collecting worms in a bowl. Amelia takes the bowl inside and unlocks the basement door. Sam asks, “Am I ever going to see it?” and Amelia responds that he will when he is older. She then sends her son outside before descending the steps. She places the bowl of worms on the ground. She looks around nervously before stiffening and bending backwards. She rights herself while saying that, “it’s all right!” She hushes the Babadook and calms herself. The bowl of worms is dragged away into to the darkness. She emerges back into the garden informing her son that, “it’s pretty quiet today” (ibid). Amelia has no trouble looking at her son anymore. He performs a magic trick and laughs proudly. The film ends with Amelia wishing her son a happy birthday.
4.2.1.2 Discussion of The Babadook Amelia falls into the category of Mentally Vulnerable Mother, rather than a Heroic Mother, because the mental vulnerability brought on by the prolonged grief she suffered after the loss of her husband acted as the catalyst for the haunting. She does ultimately save her son, but not until after he must save her. Her salvation however, comes from the fact that she is a mother. It is the love of her son that ultimately saves her from the Babadook. Her role as a mother also allowed her mental disorder to flourish. As discussed in the introduction to this
Lennington 37 Mother, May I (Die)? thesis, grief is not necessarily a mental illness. But it can become a disorder when it interferes with a person’s life for a period longer than six months. This film is another instance of a disturbed family structure. There is no co-parent for Amelia and therefore the functioning of this small family has been thrown off balance. Samuel is established as a child in need of quite a bit of attention. Attention, which Amelia is originally incapable of providing as she is grappling with untreated an unaddressed mental disorder. As discussed in the analysis of the film, talking about grief is one of the most important steps in overcoming it. At the beginning of the Film, Amelia is disconnected from not only from her son but from the world at large. The vomiting can be seen symbolically as speech. It is an expression through the mouth indicating illness. Her son and husband are reminders of the life-death cycle which Creed associates with the Abject in her book.18 Amelia’s performance as mother is deeply impacted by her mental state. She can hardly look at her son for more than just a quick glance here and there. She is constantly trying to extricate herself from his grasp. There is too much negativity, which she associates with her son. The text of the Babadook story is also important. It outlines what mental disorder actually is. Once Amelia encounters the Babadook, she is stuck with it. In the end, Amelia cannot get rid of the Babadook. It is the physical manifestation of her grief. It will always be frightening. Some days will be worse than others. But if she goes and confronts it (which the film implies she has already started doing), then she will be able to lead a healthier life.
4.3 Hereditary
Hereditary19 directed by Ari Aster is a 2017 horror film from the studio A24. The film opened in 2,924 theaters and grossed over 13.5 million dollars. According to boxofficemojo.com20, the film not only opened in more theaters than any other film from the studio, but also grossed the most money its opening weekend. Other notable films from the studio include, Ladybird, directed by Greta Gerwig and Eighth Grade, directed by Bo Burnham. Hereditary follows the Graham family as they cope with family losses. The family falls victim to a cult, however, the cult’s plan is so detailed and, at times, convoluted, that an in depth description of the plot is warranted.
18 See discussion of Monstrous Feminine 19 Aster, Ari, director. Hereditary. A24, 2018. 20 “A24 All Time Box Office Results.” Box Office Mojo, IMDbPro, www.boxofficemojo.com/studio/chart/?studio=a24.htm. Lennington 38 Mother, May I (Die)? The film opens with white text over a black screen, intended to be the obituary of a recently deceased woman, named Ellen Taper Leigh. She is predeceased by her husband and her son, but survived by her daughter and grandchildren. After the obituary, the camera focuses on a treehouse seen from inside a window and pans along the workroom filled with miniature replicas of buildings. The camera zooms in on a room in one of the replicas until it becomes a shot of the full size bedroom of the oldest son of the Graham family, Peter (Alex Wolfe). The use of the miniature as an establishing shot implies the control that will be exerted on the family by outside forces throughout the film. Peter’s father, Steven (Gabriel Byrne), wakes his sleeping son and provides him with a suit to wear to his grandmother’s funeral. Steven finds his daughter, Charlie (Millie Shapiro) sleeping in the treehouse and scolds her because it is too cold for her to be sleeping in the poorly insulated wooden structure. When he expresses concern that such behavior might make her ill, Charlie simply tells him that it is okay. At the funeral, Annie (Toni Collette) eulogizes her mother. She wears a gold necklace with a strange, ornate symbol on it. She describes her mother as a mysterious, often cold woman, but not one without her moments of genuine warmth. She remarks upon the fact that she is surprised to see so many unfamiliar people in the crowd, but chalks this up to the fact that her mother was private. From the church pews, Annie’s family watches her. Clucking noises come from Charlie as she sketches loudly in a small book, which her father shuts with a pointed glance at his daughter. After the eulogy, there is a public viewing of the body. The corpse of Ellen Taper Leigh wears a necklace identical to the one Annie wears. As Charlie approaches the casket to look at her grandmother, a man standing behind the casket smiles widely at her. Before the family leaves, Charlie remains in the room with the open casket. She stares at her grandmother and eats a bar of chocolate. A woman applies something to the corpse’s lips. Steven comes into the room and immediately asks if there are nuts in the confection. Charlie assures him that there are not. Charlie’s nut allergy, introduced here, will become relevant later in the plot. The fact that Steve has to ask his daughter whether the chocolate she is eating contains nuts is the second indication that Charlie does not seem to care for her health. Upon arriving home, Annie remarks to Steve that she feels she should be experiencing more sadness at the loss of her mother. She asks her husband if she should be feeling sadder, and he assures her that whatever she is feeling is valid. Annie has to refer to her husband regarding her feelings to seek assurances that she is handling her emotions correctly. Annie is revealed as the artist behind the creation of the miniatures. She works on them that evening preparing for a show. She is working simultaneously on a replica of a hospice and a preschool. This is an obvious allusion to the connection between life and death. Steve speaks for a while Lennington 39 Mother, May I (Die)? with Annie about her progress with her work. He then visits Peter in his room to enquire as to how the boy is holding up. Peter admits that he does not feel particularly saddened by the loss of his grandmother. Charlie is the most affected by the loss. When Annie goes to tuck her daughter in, the camera reveals odd, handmade artwork decorating the girl’s room. Annie is aware of the special connection Charlie seemed to share with her grandmother. Annie acknowledges this and attempts to comfort her daughter. She notes that Charlie was the favorite of her grandmother, and that the woman went as far as insisting that she be the one to feed the baby (it is later revealed that the grandmother actually wanted to feed Charlie from her own breast). Charlie mentions that her grandmother always wanted her to be a boy. This will be an important aspect of the plot later. Charlie asks who will take care of her now that her grandmother is dead. This takes Annie aback. Naturally, Charlie’s parents will be responsible for her, and failing that, there is still Peter. Annie cuddles with her daughter, noticing a word in a strange language drawn in pen on the wallpaper behind Charlie’s bed. She remarks that Charlie never cried as a child, not even as a baby. Annie assures Charlie that if she feels the need to cry now, it may come as a relief. Charlie does not cry. There are several odd aspects about this interaction. It is strange that Charlie would have trouble imagining a caretaker other than her grandmother when both of her parents are still alive. It is hard to conceive of a baby not crying, as crying is a natural part in a child’s development. The word on the wall is also strange, and others are found on different walls of the house as the film progresses. After wishing her daughter a goodnight, Annie ventures into her workroom. She goes through a box of her mother’s belongings. She happens upon a book entitled, Notes on Spiritualism. Inside she finds a handwritten note from her mother asking for forgiveness for concealing things from her daughter. She pleads for Annie not to hate her or lament her losses, as everything will be worth it in the end. Annie shakes her head in frustration and places the note and the book back into the box. As she shuts off the light, she sees an apparition of her mother standing, smiling in the dark. The apparition disappears once Annie turns the light back on. Her gaze is drawn to a miniature she had created of her bedroom. The scene depicted there shows Annie in bed with a baby and Ellen Taper Leigh hovering nearby with her breast exposed, wanting to feed the baby herself. This is where the implication becomes explicit that Ellen Leigh tried to breastfeed Charlie. Annie turns the miniature around so that the scene is no longer visible. This moment is significant. Annie creates every miniature in the workroom. Perhaps she recreated this scene as a form of therapy. She may have intended to create a “neutral view” of the incident (a concept which will become relevant again later). Annie is in control of what scenes are created in the miniatures. When she turns this miniature around because she doesn’t Lennington 40 Mother, May I (Die)? want to face it, implies an attempt at further control. She has just seen an apparition of her mother. It would seem that Annie is losing control and her turning this miniature around is just a manifestation of the fact that even when she creates something, she doesn’t necessarily have power over it. The next day Charlie works on a toy during class, ignoring the quiz she is supposed to be doing. The teacher scolds her and a bird flies into the closed window of the classroom. It dies on impact. As the other children react in shock, Charlie eyes a pair of scissors on the teacher’s desk. She finds the bird in the bushes after school and decapitates it. She eats a bar of chocolate and notices a woman staring at her from across the street. The woman slowly raises her hand and waves. Coupled with the smiling man at the funeral, this woman is evidence that Charlie is of great interest to strange people. Both of the observers are present at the times when Charlie confronts and interacts with death. That same school day, Peter nearly falls asleep during his class. He stares at the girl sitting in front of him, clearly attracted to her. He receives a text message from his friend inviting him to smoke weed later. He agrees. When Annie is at home working on her miniatures, she discovers that the door to her mother’s room is open and she sees a triangle seemingly scorched into the floor. She has her husband Steve lock the door, even while admitting that her fears are irrational. Steve receives a phone call informing him that the grave of Ellen Taper Leigh has been desecrated. He decides to keep this information from his wife. Later that evening, Annie attends a group therapy meeting. Before leaving, she lies to Steve and tells him that she is going to the movies. Annie is a newcomer to this particular group, intended for the survivors of the loss of loved ones. The people present at this support group are important, as certain members reappear later as members of the cult responsible for the demise of her family. As newcomer, she is invited to speak and does so with some reluctance. Though she is new to this particular group, it is not her first experience with this sort of therapy; she remarks that she had been forced to attend a similar meeting years ago. She explains that she has lost her mother and details her family history with mental disorders; however, she does not reveal any personal diagnoses. This is significant, because it is a rare example within the horror genre where the familial mental health background of a character is discussed with specificity. This is relevant to Annie’s own mental health, which establishes a well-developed basis for Annie’s behavior and her family’s reactions to it. throughout the rest of the film. Annie reveals that her mother had Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), and dementia. Her father had Psychotic Depression and ended up starving himself shortly after Annie’s birth. Her brother, Charles, had schizophrenia and hung himself when he was sixteen years old. In his Lennington 41 Mother, May I (Die)? note, he blamed his mother for “putting people into his head” (ibid,). Another important detail to note is that mental disorders are hereditary (an obvious connection to the title of the film). From the onset of the film there is a legitimate foundation established which will later justify skepticism regarding her behavior. Annie explains that the relationship between her and her mother was strained, and much of it was spent not talking. She would not let Ellen Taper Leigh meet her son when he was born. She relented, however, when Charlie was born. Annie adds that her mother immediately put her “hooks” into the child. She expresses guilt about this. She resentfully says that her mother never felt guilt for anything. Annie is deeply devoted to the idea of people admitting responsibility for their actions and this will continue to be an important character trait throughout the film. Ellen Leigh lived with the family when she became unable to live on her own. Annie says, reluctantly, that she did love her mother. She feels as though her family is ruined and that she feels blamed. She differentiates this from being “to blame”. Which indicates a sense of persecution, but not agency. She cannot fully describe what she feels blamed for. She admits that she does not believe her family is capable of supporting her. However, it isn’t clear what Annie feels she needs support for, or exactly how her family is ruined or why it would be her fault. It could be because she let her mother in to influence Charlie, but even that is unclear. So far in the film, the family has appeared functional. At home, peter is smoking marijuana, sitting by his window. He receives a text inviting him to a party taking place that weekend. There is a cut to an exterior shot of Peter blowing smoke out his window. Another puff of smoke is shown outside from a different, unseen presence. This implies that the boy is being watched. There is a cut to the next day. Charlie sits at her desk, creating odd toys. Her desk is littered with twigs and animal bones. She eats chocolates as she works, and clucks her tongue. She notices a blue flash encapsulate her room and then contract into a small blue light on her wall. It disappears. Charlie gets up and looks at a photo of her grandmother. She goes outside, holding the head of the bird she had collected earlier from school. She wanders in the backyard, past her treehouse. Annie is inside working on her miniatures when Peter comes in to talk to her. There is disconnect between Annie and her son. In this interaction with Peter, where he asks if he can go to a school “barbecue”, which is actually the party he was invited to, the conversation is stilted and oddly formal for a mother and son. Annie tells him not to drink and to invite his sister. Charlie is still outside where she sees what appears to be her grandmother sitting in front of a line of flames. Annie finds Charlie standing outside, however there is no indication of Ellen
Lennington 42 Mother, May I (Die)? Taper Leigh or the flames. Annie grabs Charlie aggressively by her arm and scolds her for being barefoot outside in cold weather. Charlie says that she wants her grandmother. Here is another instance of Charlie not caring about her health. Still holding tightly to her daughter’s arm, Annie stomps quickly back to the house. She forces her daughter to go to the party with her brother, wishing her to connect with other children, which implies a desire on the part of Annie for her daughter to become more normal. The tone of this interaction is exasperated and disciplinary. There is no tenderness, although it is clear that in her own aggressive way, Annie wants Charlie to enjoy herself. Charlie doesn’t want to go at first, but it becomes clear that it is not an option. This is an odd choice for an activity to force a child to go to. From the earlier interaction with her son, it is clear that Annie knows that there will be alcohol at the party, and her daughter is only thirteen. Ultimately, this odd choice on behalf of the mother is a crucial step in catalyzing the horror of the movie to commence. On the way to the party, Peter and Charlie pass an electric pole with the same symbol from Annie’s necklace carved into it, which implies an inevitability to the events which are about to transpire. At the party, Peter sees the girl on whom he has a crush. He approaches her and his sister is seen hovering close behind him tinkering with a toy. He wants to go into another room and smoke weed with the girl and begs his sister to wait outside with the rest of the kids at the party. He notices that someone has baked a cake and encourages his sister to go eat a slice so he can be alone with the kids his age. Charlie eats the cake and starts to have a reaction. Unbeknownst to her or Peter, there are nuts in the cake. The film then cuts from Peter chatting with other kids around a bong and Charlie sitting alone working on her toy as she exhibits trouble breathing. Eventually she goes into the room where her brother is, and tells him, “It feels like my throat is getting bigger” (ibid.). She is wheezing and it is clear that she is in need of urgent medical attention. Peter then picks her up and sprints to his car. He starts recklessly speeding to the hospital as his sister desperately tries to breathe in the back seat. She writhes and chokes and Peter, still high, is terrified as he continues to accelerate. In an attempt to get some air, Charlie rolls down the window and sticks her head out. Peter, distracted, looks in the rearview mirror and begs his sister to get back in. When his eyes return to the road, he sees a deer carcass. He swerves to avoid it and the camera cuts to Charlie with her head out of the window, then jumps to the same electric pole from earlier and in a flash we see her collide with it and the hood of her sweatshirt is now flapping in the wind of the car. Charlie has been decapitated. The camera then cuts to the car slowly coming to a stop. There is a close up on Peter’s face. He is frozen; he looks reluctantly in the rearview window. In a series Lennington 43 Mother, May I (Die)? of painful close-ups, the audience sees him slowly remove his foot from the brake upon which it looks like he was applying a painful amount of pressure, his hands slowly unclench from the wheel, and his face is shown looking horrified. He halfheartedly mutters to himself that he’s okay. He slowly and hesitantly drives home. When he arrives, he walks in a stunned haze. As he passes his parents’ room, he overhears his mother say with relief, “Oh good, they’re home” (ibid.). He then crawls into his bed and a long close up shot shows his face, his eyes wide. The close-up lingers until the morning where he overhears his mother speaking casually with Steven, saying that she is going to go pick up some Balsa wood, presumably to work further on her miniatures. Peter hears as his mother exits the house and opens the car door. There is a moment of tense silence after she gets in. Then a horrible, guttural scream of pain and horror is heard. All the while, the audience is still focused on the face of Annie’s living child. Annie’s screaming continues into the next scene where she is shown rocking back and forth on her bedroom floor as she wails that she wants to die. Steve sits quietly on the floor next to her, rubbing his wife’s back, a gesture that seems pointless. It seems that Annie is so consumed by a grief so intense that it cannot be infiltrated. The camera slowly pans to Peter standing in the hall, hearing his mother’s lamentations. The hysteria continues as the camera cuts to the funeral. As the coffin is lowered in the ground, Annie is still inconsolable and Steve has to hold onto her in order to keep her standing. Peter is silent throughout all of this. After the funeral, he stands behind glass the glass panes of an interior door, watching mourners as they pick at food laid out on tables, further indicating his separation. He has received no comfort from his mother, and Steven has been preoccupied with helping her. Peter does not utter a word after the accident until he is smoking weed with his friends at school, where he has a panic attack. He starts wheezing and says he thinks he is having a reaction. He then repeats his sister’s last words: “I think my throat is getting bigger” (ibid.). He starts sobbing and asks his friend to hold his hand. This moment is significant because it the first indication of a connection between him and his sister. Annie leaves to attend another group therapy meeting. She hesitates in the parking lot, and as she attempts to drive away, a woman flags her down. The woman introduces herself as Joan. She and Annie converse and Annie reveals that her daughter has been “killed” since the last meeting. The use of the word “killed’ is important here as it implies a subject, and it is an active way of describing what happened to her daughter. Joan tells her that she lost her son and grandson and gives Annie her phone number and offers her support, as “everybody” needs it occasionally. Annie leaves the parking lot without attending the meeting.
Lennington 44 Mother, May I (Die)? Eventually, through a series of what appear to be not wholly natural events, Annie spills paint on the piece of paper with Joan’s contact information. She goes to visit Joan and begins confiding in her. She explains the horror of finding her daughter’s headless body within the backseat of the car. She explains that there is tension between her and her son because a particularly horrific event which transpired years ago. Her children were young enough to be sharing a bed. Annie was sleepwalking and she had covered her children and herself with paint thinner. The striking of a match in Annie’s hand awaked both her and Peter. Annie, horrified, put it out immediately. She says bitterly that Peter never forgave her, and there was nothing she could do because she was asleep. This harkens back to the beginning where Annie states that she feels blamed, but not “to blame”. After the encounter with Joan, there is a shot of a full mail slot at the door of the Graham home. A shadow passes by the door and an invitation to an open séance is placed on top of the other mail. Annie seems to disregard this, but its placement and the timing of its appearance is important. The plan of the cult seems convoluted, something that relies heavily on certain seemingly random events transpiring. The fact that Annie ignores this piece of mail, but the idea of a séance is still introduced to her later, reveals that the cult has contingencies in place and that they were able to observe that the first attempt failed. When Annie is back in her workshop, she recreates the scene of the crash. She is obsessed. Steve is horrified when he sees what she is doing when he comes to retrieve her for dinner. He tells Annie that Peter better not see it. Annie doesn’t understand, she thinks of it as a “neutral” perspective of the accident. This is further evidence of her depleting mental health. Her husband informs her that dinner is ready and that he does not care if she comes or not. Steve is presented as the only stable one in the house, seemingly the least affected by the tragedy. The dinner scene is vital to the tone of the movie. The dining room is dimly lit. The meal begins in a painful silence. Peter is facing his mother and staring at his food. He then compliments his father’s cooking and Annie scoffs. Peter asks if there is something that she wants to say. Annie is immediately defensive. She tells her son that she is sick of his face because of the disdain and resentment she sees there. She says she knows it was an accident, but adds that it was a waste. She says that this tragedy could have brought the family closer together if Peter had just apologized and owned up to what he done. She concludes that no one in the family can take responsibility for what they have done. Since Peter cannot do that, she cannot forgive. After this confrontational commentary, Peter asks her about her responsibility, pointing out that Charlie did not even want to go to the party. Annie’s face contorts into an expression of what
Lennington 45 Mother, May I (Die)? can only be described as unbridled hate. Steve puts an end to the argument, without contributing anything. Later, Annie again runs into Joan in the parking lot of a craft store. Joan seems ecstatic. She explains that she went to an open séance and that she was able to communicate with her grandson. She convinces Annie to come back to her house so that she can demonstrate. During the séance, there is a hint of a blue flash. It is subtle and appears almost as a lens flare, but it follows Annie’s movements. A piece of chalk writes “I LUV U GRAMMA” on a chalkboard. Annie is horrified and leaves, but not before Joan hands her an incantation and explains to her how she can contact her daughter again. The incantation is written in a strange language, which Joan claims not to understand. Joan instructs Annie that if she wishes to perform the séance herself to communicate with her daughter, she needs every living member of her immediate family present in the house. Annie will also need something to act as an anchor, through which Charlie can communicate. Joan used her grandson’s chalkboard. That night Annie lies in bed with her husband and notices a trail of ants heading to her son’s room. She follows the trail and stares in horror as the insects seemingly devour her son’s face. Suddenly Peter sits up, the ants gone. He asks her what she is doing. The ants are gone, implying that Annie was sleepwalking. She asks if Charlie is there. What follows is an important interaction indicative of Annie’s role as a mother. What follows is their conversation verbatim: Peter: Why are you scared of me? Annie: I never wanted to be your mother P: Why? A: I was scared. I didn’t feel like a mother. But she pressured me. P: Then why did you have me? A: It wasn’t my fault. I tried to stop it. P: How? A: I tried to have a miscarriage. P: How? A: However I could. I did everything they told me not to do, but it didn’t work. I’m happy it didn’t work. P: You tried to kill me. A: No, I did not, I love you! P: Why did you try to kill me? A: I didn’t. I was trying to save you (ibid.). At this point both Annie and Peter are soaking wet and crying. Annie lights a match, both are engulfed in flames, and then Annie wakes up. Here Annie reveals the tropes she fits Lennington 46 Mother, May I (Die)? into as a mother. She is the disconnected mother in that she does not feel particularly motherly. In a parallel to what was discussed by Hollingworth, in her article about the social tools used to impel women into motherhood, Annie is like a mother who was drafted into becoming a mother. She did not desire it. This nightmare prompts Annie to conduct the séance. She arises from her bed and goes into the bathroom, where audible chanting can be heard. She later awakens her son and husband to show them what she has discovered. She is talking fast and excitedly, she seems manic. Steve is reluctant to entertain his wife in this state. She has to beg him in order for him to participate in the séance. She explains what Joan showed her, and it is apparent that Steve has never heard of Joan. Charlie’s sketchbook will be used as her anchor. He finally relents after Peter expresses willingness to participate. Peter is terrified, as Annie appears to channel Charlie. She speaks using her daughter’s voice and it sounds like the girl is upset and confused. Peter begs his mother to stop. Steven runs to turn on the light and throws water on his wife, putting an abrupt end to the séance. Annie is confused. Peter just sobs into his father’s shoulder. The next day, Peter starts hallucinating at school and is seeing a blue flash everywhere. He catches sight of his reflection in a glass cabinet next to his desk and stares in horror as his reflection smiles at him. He hears a tongue click and jumps violently. He excuses himself, claiming that he has to use the bathroom. He calls his father in hysterics. Steve later calls Annie as she is working, blaming her for the mental state of their son, implying that Peter needs protection from his mother. Steve hangs up on Annie and she calls him back to say defiantly that she is no longer sleepwalking. She thinks that this is the only danger she could pose to her offspring. Annie ends up destroying all of her miniature creations in the workroom. The crash scene and the miniature of the Graham house, however, remain intact. When Steve arrives home, he is repulsed by a smell in the house. He is distracted however, when he discovers his wife surrounded by wreckage in her workroom. He is further disturbed when he sees that a small headless figure has been placed in the bed of the miniature version of Peter’s room. Though Steve has shown ability to continue with his daily functioning after the loss of his daughter, he is not unaffected. He leaves his wife sitting in the workroom and sinks into the couch in the living room. He takes pills from a prescription bottle, and after some hesitation, he takes more. Annie eventually leaves the workroom. She hears scribbling coming from her daughter’s room. The sketchbook used as an anchor to communicate with her daughter during the séance lies open on the bed. As Annie approaches it, she realizes that the pages are filling themselves with drawings of her son, crying with his eyes crossed out. Lennington 47 Mother, May I (Die)? Meanwhile, Peter has been in his room sleeping. He wakes upon hearing is sister’s characteristic tongue click and sees an apparition of her. Charlie’s head rolls off and becomes a ball on the floor. Hands then reach up from behind Peter’s bed and start pulling at his head. Annie appears in the room, and Peter immediately thinks the hands were his mother’s. Annie assures him that they were not. She speaks rapidly, telling her son that she is aware that there is a problem and that she will fix it. She implores him not to tell his father. Annie attempts to burn the sketchbook in the fireplace, but her sleeve catches fire, seemingly connected to the book. She immediately quenches the flame. The next day Annie returns to Joan’s apartment, intending to confront her about what the séance actually was. Joan does not answer as Annie bangs on her door, but an interior shot of the apartment reveals that the toys Charlie had created are now sitting on the kitchen table. In the center of the table, there is a picture of Peter with his eyes punctured. At school, Peter sits alone, eating lunch outside. He sees Joan yelling at him from across the street. She yells the words that were written on the walls of the Graham house. She tells Peter that she “expels” him. Peter just watches her in numb fear. Annie, unsuccessful in her attempts to find Joan, runs home and tears open the box of her mother’s things. She discovers a book entitled, Invocations. She happens upon a highlighted passage concerning an entity called Paimon who is a god of mischief and a king of hell. The book reveals that Paimon is associated with mischief and the arts. He is a male entity and often ends up possessing female hosts, which he resents. He possesses only those who are vulnerable, and will settle if there is no available hosts. Summoning him brings wealth and knowledge. Annie continues searching through the box and discovers a photo album, in which she finds pictures of Joan with Ellen Taper Leigh, Annie’s mother. Some of the pictures seem to depict ritualistic scenes. The symbol from the necklace worn by Annie and her mother feature prominently in the photos. At this point it is clear that Annie’s mother was a member of a cult involved with Paimon. It would account for the suicide of Annie’s brother Charles, which was originally blamed schizophrenic delusions, in which Ellen Taper Leigh put voices in her head. Charles, Annie’s brother was likely the original intended host for Paimon. When that failed, Annie was pressured into having children, as evidenced by the conversation she holds with Peter in her dream, right before the seance. Peter was kept away from his grandmother as a child. That would leave Charlie, Annie’s daughter as the only viable vessel. She would have been vulnerable as a baby and therefore easy to posses. This would also account for Ellen Taper Leigh’s possessiveness over Charlie and the odd behavior of strangers in her presence. The decapitation of Charlie was planned, however, because Paimon can’t be satisfied with a female host. Therefore, through the Lennington 48 Mother, May I (Die)? careful manipulations of the cult it appears that Peter is being weakened to a state vulnerable enough for possession. At school, Peter walks down the hallway and sees a blue flash, which leads his gaze toward a man standing behind a door with a window. The man grins and waves in a way that is reminiscent of how others acted oddly around Charlie. In the next scene, the audience sees Steve at work for the first time in the film. He checks his emails and as he is reading them, his email address reveals him to be a psychiatrist, as it is [email protected]. This is a subtle detail, but a significant one. He has experience in the field of mental health. Therefore, his reluctance to believe his wife who is behaving erratically, is actually backed up by his psychiatric expertise. At home, Annie ventures up into the attic and discovers the source of the horrible smell that Steven had noticed earlier. Her mother’s headless corpse. There is a single lit candle, and on the wall, the symbol from her necklace has been drawn in what appears to be blood. Peter, still at school, appears even more distraught than he was at lunchtime. He hallucinates the rearview mirror from the night of the accident and suddenly hears a tongue click. He raises his arm in the air and goes rigid. He then slams his face into the desk, breaking his nose. He recoils in horror. Steven is called to pick up his son from school. He breaks down on the way home when he nearly gets in an accident after almost running a red light. When Steve and Peter arrive home, Annie rushes out. She is appalled by what happened to her son, but Steven curtly tells her to just help him carry the boy up to his room. Once Peter is in bed, Annie begs her husband to go upstairs so he can see the corpse. Steven reluctantly agrees and upon discovering the corpse, becomes suspicious of Annie. He did not tell her about the phone call regarding the grave desecration, as he did not want to upset her. Despite the fact that “movies” were Annie’s cover for going to therapy, Steven believes that they were a cover for her to dig up her mother. Annie frantically tries to explain to her husband that the invocation Joan had given her for the ritual was actually probably something else. Annie is aware that other people must have been coming into the house. Annie acknowledges that it is her fault and wishes to take responsibility. She just needs Steve to burn the sketchbook for her, thinking that it will burn her but solve the problem. Annie thinks that there is a curse. At this point Steve adamantly says that he will no longer play into her delusions. Even though Annie is finally aware of the situation, her manic behavior has led to the loss of her credibility in her husband’s eyes. Annie’s grief, and her reaction to it, have made her helpless when she actually became aware of the truth. Frustrated, Annie grabs the book from her husband’s hand and throws it onto the already burning fire. Instead of igniting herself, however, Steven bursts into flames. This switch can be attributed to the mischievous nature of Paimon Lennington 49 Mother, May I (Die)? already established from the book Annie found. Annie watches in horror as her husband burns until a blue flash seems to enter her and her face goes blank. Though he resents possessing females, she has become vulnerable enough to become Paimon’s temporary host. Peter wakes up in the middle of the night, wincing from the pain in his nose. Annie can be seen hovering in the corner of his room. Peter gets out of bed to search for his parents and Annie soundlessly crawls along the ceiling, following him. She continues to float in the background as Peter discovers the charred remains of his father. Once Annie makes her presence known, Peter fleas to the attic, terrified by the unnatural movements of his mother. In the attic, Peter becomes aware of the flies. He has shut the attic door behind him, but hears pounding from the other side. He begs his mother to stop. The camera cuts to Annie and she is upside-down and violently banging her head against the attic door. Once it goes quiet, Peter looks around the attic. The corpse of his grandmother is gone, but the outline of her body remains visible on the floor. There are lit candles everywhere. Inside the outline of the body is the vandalized photo of him from Joan’s apartment. Thinking he is asleep, Peter hits himself repeatedly. He is distracted by a sawing sound. Looking up, he discovers his mother floating in the attic, staring at him as she decapitates herself with a wire. He becomes aware that there are other people in the attic. They are naked and smiling at him. This is too much for Peter and he throws himself out of the window, landing motionless in the garden. The sound of sawing continues and ends with a thud. A blue light gently floats from the attic and into Peter. Peter slowly rises. The headless body of Annie floats into the treehouse. Peter follows, passing naked people in the bushes. He ascends the ladder to the tree house and the room is full of people in various stages of undress. All of them are crouching and facing a large mannequin with Charlies head placed on top. Directly in front of this disturbing alter are the headless bodies of Annie and her mother, posed in a worshipping position. On the wall of the treehouse, there is a framed picture of Annie’s mother with a plaque underneath reading: “Queen Leigh”. Joan rises from the worshippers. She calls Peter Charlie and tells him that he is Paimon. The cult has “corrected” his body and they are ready to receive his wisdom and riches. She places a crown on Paimon’s head.
4.3.1 Discussion of Hereditary
The storyline of Hereditary follows the hidden intentions of the cult worshipping Paimon. The seemingly convoluted plan played off Annie’s mental vulnerabilities. It made her seem untrustworthy to her husband, even when she was clear enough to see that she had been manipulated. The demon required a vulnerable host, and preferred a male body. This is
Lennington 50 Mother, May I (Die)? evidenced throughout the first act of the film when Charlie is constantly disregarding her health. She should be aware of her nut allergy, and yet her father had to ask her at the funeral if the candy bar she was eating was safe. The writing on the wall was all done by the cult. The extra puff of smoke from outside Peter’s window was from a member surveilling the intended host for Paimon. The cult is also responsible for the placement of Ellen Taper Leigh’s body in the attic. Paimon needs a vulnerable host. Annie is employed as a tool in order to break him down. Annie’s grief is exploited. The relationship to mental disorders also casts further doubts upon the validity of what she is saying to her husband when she ultimately becomes aware of the realities. A key to this plan being successful is the all-consuming grief of a mother. Although the real mother who acted as the key to the supernatural was the unloving grandmother. This movie also differentiates itself from the other films of child possession. For one thing, Charlie is not possessed by the devil, but rather one of nine kings of Hell. Moreover, although Paimon ends up possessing a boy, he starts out in the body of a girl. Charlie displays no outward characteristics of evil. She is simply odd. She seems as largely emotionless. However, her mother deeply loves her, so the possession aspect of the film come off as a twist. Interestingly, this movie is also influenced by a corrupting mother. As Annie reveals during the group therapy session, her brother killed himself because he felt like his mother was putting voices in his head.. This woman is essentially a witch, and a key element in the success of the events is the grief of the mother. While the cult’s plan of events seems to rely heavily on coincidence, upon further examination, there were actually contingencies in place. Annie received an invitation in the mail for an open séance. She ignores it. So when she runs into Joan in the parking lot of the craft store, the cult is clearly not leaving anything up to fate. She has to be unstable enough to in order to succumb to the temptation to speak to her daughter. She has to feel disconnected enough from her family enough in order to not turn to them for support, but to seek outside help from untrustworthy, but appealing sources. She mentioned in the beginning that she had been forced to attend the group therapy earlier so the seed had been planted. When she doesn’t want to go to the group therapy session, Joan stops her. The grief of Annie is easily manipulated by malevolent sources. It acts as part of a ritual. The mother is the doorway through which her children enter the world. Within her, the child transitions from not existing to something alive. This transition to life creates a bond. When the living child transitions from life to death, the mother is often portrayed as feeling it more strongly than her male counterpart and is therefore more likely to fall apart
Lennington 51 Mother, May I (Die)? 4.4 Lights Out
Lights Out21 is a 2016 movie directed by David. F Sandberg. The plot of the movie concerns a mother who is seemingly friends with a monster who can only exist in the shadows. Her young son is endangered by this and his older half-sister has to come to his aid. The film opens with a father, Paul (Billy Burke) at work video chatting with his son, Martin (Gabriel Bateman). He enquires as to how the boy’s mother, Sophie (Maria Bello), is doing. The son expresses concern about how his mother is feeling and Paul comforts him, assuring him that he is doing what he can to help Sophie. The son informs his father that his mother has been talking to herself. The boy is quite young, and is clearly afraid. Seemingly, in connection with his promises to make Sophie “better,” Paul pulls out a file with “Mulberry Hill California” stamped on it. He opens it but is interrupted by an employee who is ready to leave for the day. As the woman is closing up, she stands in a hallway lit only in specific areas by inadequate overhead lights, which leave gaps of darkness between them. There is a figure in the darkness. She notices that the figure can only move within the darkness. When the lights are on, the figure is invisible. When the lights are off, the figure appears to have come closer. The coworker rushed to warn Paul but he is in the midst of another phone call regarding his wife, expressing the concern he feels about the toll that his wife’s behavior is taking on his son. He asks the person on the other end of the line if there is anything they can do to get Sophie to stop locking herself in the closet. He expresses reluctance to call what he wants to do an “intervention,” but it is clear that he is in the process of making a plan to help his wife. He is preoccupied by his thoughts and dismisses his coworker’s warnings about there being something in the shadows. Ultimately, on the way out he is overtaken by the figure and is killed, thus leaving his son vulnerable to his wife’s inadequate care. The responsibility for the boy’s care will soon be taken up by the boy’s half-sister, Rebecca (Teresa Palmer). The film then cuts to the apartment of Rebecca. A poster on her wall depicts a monster while heavy metal music plays in the background. This is the way the film introduces the audience to her. She is in bed with Bret (Alexander DiPersia) but she rebuffs his attempts at intimacy beyond sex. He tries to spend the night, but Rebecca kicks him out. She balks at the idea of him calling himself her boyfriend despite the fact that they have exclusively been seeing each other for eight months. This establishes from early on a reluctance toward commitment and loving relationships.
21 Sandberg, David F, director. Lights Out. New Line Cinema, 2016. Lennington 52 Mother, May I (Die)? The film then cuts to Martin’s room, panning over a dresser full of photographs which reveal to the audience that Rebecca is his sister. Martin is in bed but hears indistinct conversation his mother is having with someone in her room. The boy goes to investigate and catches a glimpse of a creature in his mother’s dark room. His mother casually wishes him good night as the figure looms eerily behind her. He goes back to bed and his lights flicker and he hears scratching against his door as the being attempts to enter his room. It can be inferred that Martin has a poor night’s sleep as the next day he is shown to be sitting in the school nurse’s office. The nurse cannot get ahold of his mother, so Rebecca is called. Rebecca and Bret head to the school where a woman greets them named Emma (Andi Osho). Emma enquires about Sophie and Rebecca defiantly assures her that her mother is taking her antidepressants. From this conversation, the audience learns that Rebecca and Martin are half siblings and that Rebecca’s own father ran off when she was 10. It is also revealed that this is the third time that week where Martin has fallen asleep in class—implying that the dark being has been tormenting him longer than just the previous night. Rebecca goes into the nurse’s office to pick up her brother. After meeting with the school nurse, Bret drives Rebecca and Martin to Sophie’s house. Martin wants to sleep at his sister’s place since he says he cannot sleep at home. Rebecca insists that they at least try and have Martin spend the night with Sophie. Bret tries to join Rebecca and Martin as they exit the car, but Rebecca makes him wait for her. At the door, she asks Martin whether her mother has been having any social life and Martin responds that she has been seeing a woman named Diana frequently. Rebecca stops in her tracks, implying that Diana has been a problem in the past. She says that the same thing happened to her when her dad left, and that she had really bad dreams about Diana, but says that they were nothing more than dreams because Diana is not real. Sophie opens the door and asks Martin why he is home so early, Martin rushes inside and tells his mother that Rebecca will explain everything. What follows is a confrontation between Rebecca and her mother, in which Rebecca accuses her mother of neglecting to take her medication. This implies that when Sophie is on medication she doesn’t see or interact with Diana. Rebecca also asks her mother whether she has been seeing a therapist. The mother deflects this by saying that she will not confide her problems in a stranger. She had gone through that before. This implies that therapy is not a useful option for someone who is suffering. Regardless of the supernatural aspect of this film, this woman has just lost her husband. Therapy in this case should not be displayed in a negative light and has the ability to further stigmatize mental health care. Lennington 53 Mother, May I (Die)? Rebecca asks her mom how long she has been off her medication. Martin is shown packing hurriedly he peeks into his mother’s room and sees the dark figure again. The mother becomes defensive, accusing Rebecca of calling her a bad mother. Rebecca tells Sophie that she is going to hold on to Martin until Sophie is stable. Sophie begs Rebecca not to take her son. It is clear that Sophie does care for her children, despite her apparent reluctance to give up her connection to Diana. Once Rebecca and Martin are back in Bret’s car, he asks if she is, “doing this to help him, or to hurt her” (ibid.), implying that even though Rebecca has sought to maintain emotional distance from him, he is still aware of the nature of the relationship that Rebecca has to her mother. Once they are back at the apartment, Rebecca feeds her brother and brushes his hair, taking on a motherly role. Martin asks that if their mother is crazy if it means that they are crazy as well. Mental illness does tend to be hereditary so this question is an important one. From what has been revealed by the narrative so far, it would seem that Sophie is suffering from some sort of mental disorder, which she treats with antidepressants. However, she is apparently subject to visits from a malevolent outside force (which at this point everyone believes to be a hallucination) whenever she stops taking her medication. The monster is tied to Sophie’s mental health. During the night, Rebecca hears the same scratching that had kept Martin awake at his mother’s house. She sees the figure that can only exist in the dark. At this point in the film, especially within the context of the question that Martin asked earlier about whether or not they too, were “crazy” this could be read as a metaphor of the mental disorder being experienced by the children of the mother within whom it originated. Emma from Child Protective Services, whom Rebecca met when she picked up Martin from the school nurse’s office, visits Rebecca the next morning and immediately asks if she has taken the boy. Emma barges into the apartment upon hearing Martin’s voice. Rebecca tries to convince the woman that Martin’s home with Sophie’s is not a stable environment for a child. Emma informs Rebecca that in order to remove Martin from the environment in which he dwells with his mother, Rebecca would have to file charges against her mother and go to court and begin an arduous process in order to obtain custody, in which she would have to prove herself a fit guardian in order to keep Martin out of foster care. Rebecca insists that she can be a responsible guardian. Emma then takes a cursory glance around the apartment and her eyes linger on punk band posters and marijuana paraphernalia sitting casually on a table. In this moment, Rebecca is cast as an unfit surrogate mother and unfit for the role of child rearing. Martin then leaves with the agent as Rebecca looks on helplessly. Lennington 54 Mother, May I (Die)? She then tidies up her apartment and discovers the word “Diana” carved into the floor, implying that the scratching sounds from the night before were more than just a symptom of the same vaguely defined mental disorder exhibited by her mother. The film then goes into a flashback in which the audience sees a young Rebecca drawing a picture by lamplight of herself, her mother and father. The lights flicker, the sketchbook disappears, Rebecca hears scratching from the closet and upon turning on the light, she discovers that her father has been obscured with thick black crayon markings and a black figure labeled “Diana” has been crudely drawn in between her and her mother. As is common in horror films, Rebecca must now question her sanity. What she originally explained away as dreams to her brother, are now harder to classify as such. Though it is not explicitly addressed onscreen, this leaves Rebecca with two options. Either she is suffering from a strong mental disorder herself, or what she is experiencing is something outside of her mind and was always real. This conflict is resolved when she meets up with Bret and asks him to drive her to her mom’s house. She tells him that she needs to find out about Diana, because, “the bitch is real” (ibid.). Bret is perplexed but he obliges and takes Rebecca to her mother’s house. Upon arriving at Sophie’s home, they discover it is empty and they proceed to search it. Rebecca discovers a photo of her mother as a child standing outside on a sunny day, next to a girl dressed in dark clothing and holding a black umbrella, shielding her from any light. Rebecca turns the photo over and on the back is written: “Sophie and Diana, Mulberry Hill, CA.” This harkens back to the file possessed by Paul in the opening of the film. Rebecca then finds a box and finds within it a tape recorder. She plays the tape recorder as she continues searching. The recording plays as such: Patient 283 admitted October 6, 1984. The patient suffers from a unique skin disorder that manifests itself in an extreme sensitivity to light. Uh, patient’s stay here has been very problematic. She has a history of violence and lately she’s been obsessed with one of the patients in the heliotherapy ward, a young girl named Sophie (ibid.). The doctor then brings in the patients and orders that her restraints be kept on. He then interviews patient 283, whom he greets as Diana. He asks Diana why she hurt Sophie, to which Diana replies: “She was getting better.” The recording then continues to an experimental session where they attempt to expose Diana to light as an experimental treatment. It turns out that this therapy caused Diana to evaporate. There are many things to critique about this scene. The main thing being would be how Sophie came to possess a tape recorder from a doctor discussing another patient’s treatment. Such a thing would certainly be confidential. Perhaps Sophie stole it, but this is never addressed in the film. Another gaping problem would be the experimental treatment of exposing a patient Lennington 55 Mother, May I (Die)? who is extremely photosensitive to very bright light. Of course, the patient would not disappear as the movie suggests, however, her illness which is characterized by extreme sensitivity to light, would have caused the girl to have suffered burns, furthermore the treatment for that condition certainly does not involve exposure therapy, but rather an avoidance of light. Ultimately, in this scene Rebecca has uncovered evidence of horrific malpractice and a dubiously obtained tape recorder. This scene does nothing but portray the healthcare facility where Sophie apparently spent a portion of her childhood as a place of inept care. This combined with the oversimplification of the mother’s mental health is ultimately a poor portrayal of institutionalization, which some people certainly benefit from. Rebecca continues her search through the dimly lit house of her mother’s and ends up getting shut in her room after discovering the picture she had drawn in the flashback. Now stuck in her dark childhood room, Rebecca is warned to stay away. Diana informs Rebecca that she will not be sent away again, which implies that she is indeed tied to Sophie’s mental health as one can infer that when Sophie is properly medicated, Diana ceases to exist. This can be read as a metaphor, as it is common for people to stop taking their medication once they start feeling better, only to have their symptoms return. Bret and Rebecca leave with the box of information concerning Diana and Sophie’s childhood relationship. Sophie and Martin return to the house. Martin asks his mother whether she has been taking her “vitamins” which one can infer to mean her medication. Sophie deflects saying that she wants to fix the fact that she has been somewhat distant from Martin. She promises him a night of movies. She then says, “I think a little personal time is what we need. All three of us” (ibid.). Clearly, Sophie is not doing better and it is safe to assume that she is not taking her “vitamins”. While watching the movie, Sophie gets up and turns off the lights. Martin starts to panic and Sophie attempts to calm him down by explaining who Diana is as her friend who had something bad happen to her. Instead of disappearing due to the light therapy, she came back to Sophie. Diana is visible creeping in the background. Sophie speaks of how she had abandoned Diana for years. Sophie promises that Diana is going to stay now; “as long as I keep my head clear” (ibid.), which further implies that Diana is tied to Sophie’s mental disorder and that the medication kept her away. Bret and Rebecca later discuss the fact that they were unaware that Sophie had spent a portion of her life institutionalized. For what exactly Sophie was institutionalized was never addressed, and this exemplifies the problem of vague mental disorder becoming a catalyst of horror. Martin runs away to his sister’s house to inform her that things with his mother are getting worse. Despite fears that Rebecca will not believe him, he informs his sister that Diana is real. Lennington 56 Mother, May I (Die)? Rebecca of course believes him and goes on to inform him that his father was doing a fair amount of research into Diana’s past. Apparently, the father discovered that Diana was said to be evil with the ability to get inside people’s heads. Again the “skin disorder” is discussed, which feeds into the idea that physical maladies and illnesses endow victims with malevolent abilities. This is problematic, as it takes an individual who suffers from a traumatic illness, transforms them into something dehumanized and therefore not someone in need of special care, and turns them into a villain. Diana was taken to Mulberry Hill Psychiatric hospital, when arguably she should have been placed in a hospital better equipped to deal with the girl’s physical ailments. Rebecca explains to her brother that Diana probably also got into Sophie’s head. Rebecca explains that they were not friends, that, “Diana only comes around when mom was at her worst.” Rebecca also informs her brother of the experimental procedure in which Diana died, but managed to live on due to her mysterious power of being able to get inside of people’s heads. Rebecca thinks that Sophie is the only connection that Diana has to the world. She comforts her brother by suggesting that if they could get their mom “better” that they could break the connection. Martin explains that it will not work because that was what his father was trying to do. Looking at Sophie as a hyperbolic symbol of someone mentally ill, this is also a damaging message to be sending, that attempting to get someone help is ultimately a fruitless effort This idea also, of Diana’s only connection being Sophie also undermined because she seems to also be able to haunt Sophie’s children when they are away from their mother. Meaning that Diana could be viewed as an infectious mental disorder. The idea of an infectious mental disorder is troubling, as the implication of possible contagion can lead to further stigmatization of individuals with mental disorders. Eventually Bret, Rebecca and Martin go together to Sophie’s house in order to speak with her about Diana. Sophie explains Diana as friend. Finally, Sophie’s mental illness is identified as depression, which was why she was institutionalized in the first place. Rebecca accuses Sophie of having let Diana into the house, a dead woman. This idea of a mentally ill mother “letting something in” was previously discussed regarding The Babadook. Sophie then goes on to berate her daughter for leaving her. She had to attach her need for affection onto the malevolent Diana. She does not wish to shut her friend Diana out in the same way that she feels her daughter has shut her out of her life. Rebecca wants to take Martin home again with her, but Martin refuses this in an uncharacteristic change of heart. He adamantly insists that as their mother, Sophie needs her children more than ever. The mother, who is supposed to be a protector is now firmly in the role of one needing to be protected.
Lennington 57 Mother, May I (Die)? Rebecca, Bret and Martin decide to stay the night and confront Diana. The film climaxes with Diana finally trying to actually cause harm to Sophie’s children, rather than just intimidate them, which her earlier behavior seemed to indicate. Sophie becomes upset and shouts at Diana: “I told you. Don’t hurt my kids” (ibid.). Sophie ends up shooting herself because Diana’s only avenue into the physical world is through Sophie. This is portrayed as a sacrifice in order to save her children, but this is a highly troubling way to resolve the conflict. The mental disorder of the mother manifested itself through Diana. It was proven that Diana could be controlled through proper medication. If this film were to be read as a metaphor for mental disorder made corporeal, then it suggests suicide as a solution. The mental disorder of Sophie as a mother haunted her family, much like the mental disorder in real life. Nevertheless, that by no means should justify suicide as a cure.
4.4.1 Discussion of Lights Out and further analysis
The quality of screen time that Sophie is afforded in the film is limited. She remains in the house for most of the movie only venturing out briefly. Her only relationship with someone outside of her family is with Diana, and Diana is a figure that only exists in connection to Sophie and her mental vulnerabilities. As the movie progresses, Rebecca, replaces Sophie as Martin’s mother in a way parallel to Diana replacing Martin as Sophie’s child. Just as a child, Diana is completely dependant upon the protection and care of Sophie for her continued survival. When her family tries to rescue Sophie from Diana, Diana attacks Sophie’s family and Sophie is angered at Diana and decides to kill herself and Diana by committing suicide. Ultimately, the suicide is presented as though it were a heroic act of the mother in order to save her children, despite the fact that earlier in the film it is mentioned that Diana goes away with the proper medication. The film even ends on a hopeful note as it is implied that Rebecca has overcome her intimacy issues with her boyfriend, thus creating a pseudo-nuclear family where Martin will be safe. Lights Out and The Babadook represent the mental illnesses of two different mothers, which manifest into something malevolent. Both are driven by grief. Sophie internalized the loss of her friend, allowing it to take over her life and affect her relationships with her family. Amelia tried to deal with the loss of her husband by shutting it away, by forcing it into a place where eventually it exploded. In terms of the figure of the mentally disturbed mother, the depiction of Sophie is troubling. It was established within the film that with proper treatment, Diana would lose her power. However, instead of seeking and receiving the help she needed, Sophie simply kills herself, which is a damaging act to present as a solution. The argument could also be made Lennington 58 Mother, May I (Die)? that the Babadook shares a similar connection to Amelia. He can only exist, because he is the manifestation of her grief. It could also be a “solution” for Amelia to die in order to sever the tie the Babadook has to the physical world. However, instead of leaving her young son an orphan, she chooses instead to go on living. The final Scene in the Babadook, she and her son are seen gathering worms. Both go into the basement and feed the Babadook. The Babadook is still dangerous. Perhaps it is possible that he may overwhelm Amelia again, but the ending of the film makes that seem unlikely, especially if taken from the perspective of mental health care. The loss of her husband will always haunt her. But she has to acknowledge it, share it with her son and learn to coexist with it. Much like mental disorder in the real world, these things do not simply go away. The importance of both Sophie and Amelia as mothers in these horror films is that they are the key to the malevolent supernatural due to their mental vulnerabilities. Through their grief and struggles as mothers, they open a door through which evil can enter. They each have their own way of closing that door. Amelia keeps it locked until she has to confront what is inside, and Sophie decides to destroy the door. When it comes to the analysis of Mother with Mental Vulnerabilities, it is particularly important to pay attention to how treatment for these mental vulnerabilities or disorders are portrayed. As is the case with Lights Out, therapeutic settings such as institutions are portrayed as places, which can foster evil. If Diane is to be read as an embodied mental disorder, then the film’s solution for treating it is quite harmful. Individuals suffering from mental disorders often affect their families in dramatic ways. Sophie is dogged by an embodiment of her mental disorder which the film establishes could be controlled through proper medication. However, at the climax of the film, the only way Sophie sees it possible to get this mental disorder to stop influencing her family is to put them through the trauma of her suicide. The ending of Lights Out is presented as optimistic ignoring the unnecessary suicide of the mother. It is clear that Rebecca has overcome her intimacy issues with Bret, so the boy will have a pseudo-nuclear family who can take care of him. Though the film, Hereditary does not malign mental healthcare quite so harshly as Lights Out, it is still not represented as a place of safety. Members of the cult are present at the group therapy meeting. However, Annie’s mental vulnerabilities are exploited throughout the film.
4 Heroic Mothers The Heroic Mother is the embodiment of the “maternal instinct”. When discussing motherhood in art, Hollingworth mentions overjoyed, saintly Madonnas. In fact, the art which Hollingworth discusses seems to be inundated with saccharine depictions of mothers who are
Lennington 59 Mother, May I (Die)? fulfilled by motherhood. She goes on to say that one would never expect that laws would need to be put in place in order to prevent things like abortion or child endangerment (Hollingworth, 26). The Heroic Mother closely resembles what Hollingworth is referring to here. From the strength of the devotion of the Heroic Mother to her children, it would be hard to imagine that these mothers would have had doubts. Even dead, a Heroic Mother is there to help her child. And when alive she is granted with the supernatural ability to withstand almost anything in order to help her children. Heroic Mothers display heroism in different ways; however, it is always in relation to her children. There are two types of Heroic Mother who will be discussed in this chapter. The main type is the Warrior. The Warrior will often literally go to Hell and back to save her children. The second type of Heroic Mother is the Saint. The Saint is dead. However, she fulfilled her role of mother in life so well that her mere memory becomes a driving force within the film.
4.1 The Warrior
In Slasher films like the Halloween22 and the resulting franchise, the crazed killer is often difficult to kill. The slasher can survive multiple physical injuries that would easily kill or incapacitate any normal human being. The Warrior is similarly hard to kill, even harder because the Warrior triumphs against the threat to her children, which may include defending them from a slasher like killer, as evidenced by the film, Orphan23. The Warrior is the key element in saving her children. Regardless of people who die along the way, a movie involving the Warrior will end happily if the mother and her children are attacked. The husband, whether he lives or dies plays a secondary role in the rescue of the children—if he plays one at all. Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) from William Friedkin’s The Exorcist24 is a Warrior who will stop at nothing to save her daughter, Regan (Linda Blair) from the clutches of a demon. When medical science offers who no assistance she proactively seeks the help of the Church. She is there for every horrifying step of her daughter’s exorcism. She get thrown around her daughter’s room. She forces people to take her seriously that there is something incredibly wrong with her daughter. At the end of the film, despite the deaths of multiple people, she and her daughter are alright. The father plays absolutely no role in the rescue of the daughter and he makes no physical appearance in the film.
22 Carpenter, John, director. Halloween. Compass International Pictures, 1978. 23 Collet-Serra, Jaume, director. Orphan. Warner Bros., 2009. 24 Friedkin, William, director. The Exorcist. Warner Bros., 1973. Lennington 60 Mother, May I (Die)? Stanley Kubrick's 1980 film The Shining25 also features a Warrior in Wendy Torrance (Shelley Duvall) who braves unspeakable horrors in order to save her son from her deranged husband, Jack (Jack Nicholson). At the climax of the film she rescues her son and simply leaves her husband to freeze in the snow. Her husband is a threat to her and her child at that point and even though she has seen the horrors of the hotel and it is quite possible that Jack is not beyond saving, Wendy will not risk it because her son is the most important thing to her.
4.1.1 Orphan
Orphan (2009), directed by Jaume Collet Sera begins with a dream sequence in which the main protagonist the Kate (Vera Farmiga) is at the hospital to deliver a baby only to discover that she has miscarried. She undergoes a bloody surgery, which her husband, John (Peter Sarsgaard) films. She has no bodily autonomy, she is forced to go into the surgery without anesthetic to deliver the dead baby and a nurse proudly holds out a crying bundle of rags to Kate once the traumatic operation is complete. Kate wakes up upset and goes to the bathroom where she examines a c-section scar in the mirror. She takes a pill from a prescription bottle and sits on the floor. She is in therapy in the next scene, discussing her nightmare with Dr. Browning (Margot Martindale). Kate thinks that the nightmare is not tied directly to the miscarriage but rather the fact that she and her husband wish to adopt a child. She also informs her Dr. Browning that she drove past a liquor store the other day, but resisted the urge to go in—establishing that she is a recovering alcoholic. Dr. Browning assures her that she is qualified to adopt, and it is up to her whether or not it’s the right thing for her. Kate and John already have two children, Max (Aryana Engineer) and Danny (Jimmy Bennett). Max is the younger sibling and she is deaf. After her appointment with Dr. Browning, Kate picks up Max from school. On the way home, a pregnant woman crossing the street distracts Kate. Kate runs a red light and almost is hit by a car. Once home, Kate practices piano, but is distracted by her daughter throwing a ball against a wall. She goes outside to tell her daughter to quiet down and John and Danny arrive home. Danny is sullen, brushing his mother off when she asks him about his sports team practice. Later that evening, Kate is in Max’s room to tuck her in. Max removes her hearing aids and places them on her bedside table before crawling into bed. Her habit of doing this will become a relevant plot point later. Max asks her mother to read her a story. She picks a book that is meant to help explain the concept of miscarriage and stillbirth to children—how she was
25 Kubrick, Stanley, director. The Shining. Warner Bros., 1980. Lennington 61 Mother, May I (Die)? expecting to meet a sister, but the sister went to heaven instead. Kate signs the story, holding back tears. Max asks her mother when she will get a new sister. Kate sadly answers that she does not know. It is clear that she is very upset. Later, Kate journals in bed and gets up to take more pills in the bathroom. Her husband who tries to initiate intimacy with her surprises her, but she pushes him away. She has a hard time being physically affectionate since the loss of the baby. In bed, John and Kate discuss the adoption. John says that Kate does not have to do it if she is not ready. Kate explains: “I want to take the love I felt for Jessica and I want to give it to someone who really needs it” (Orphan 2009). Although the baby never had the chance to be a physical presence in the house, she still disrupted the family order. She was expected and they had made room for her. Now there is a hole in the family that needs to be filled, at least in terms of what Kate needs. The next day the couple end up going to a Catholic orphanage where they meet the kindly sister Abigail (CCH Pounder), who works at the orphanage and will help them with the adoption process. The couple end up taking home Esther (Isabelle Fuhrman), a precociously talented artist from Russia. As John and Kate fill out paperwork, Sister Abigail informs the couple that the family who originally adopted her from Russia died in a fire. She says that Esther is a quiet, clever girl and only causes problems if someone attempts to take off the ribbons she wears around her wrists and neck. During the drive home from the orphanage, Esther begins learning sign language to communicate better with Max. When they arrive home, Max runs out of the house into her mother’s arms. Esther introduces herself using sign language. Kate explains that her daughter is almost entirely deaf, but the hearing aids help her in reading lips. Once inside Esther meets John’s mother, Grandma Barbara (Rosemary Dunsmore) and Danny. Danny is cold to her and mocks her clothing as soon as she is out of earshot. Esther is excited to see the piano so Kate offers to give her lessons. Esther is enthused by the house and her bedroom. She opens presents in the living room as Danny watches enviously from a distance where he is playing video games with his friends. He attempts to get his dad’s attention, but is brushed off. Danny and his friend retreat to his treehouse, where they pull out an adult magazine that Danny had hidden under a loose floorboard. After the presents, Esther and Max play outside. Kate watches them from the window as she washes dishes. Grandma Barbara stands behind her and comments that Max seems comfortable playing by the lake, given what happened and muses that she must have forgotten. This lake incident is an important aspect of Kate’s backstory and will be brought up again several times throughout the film. It is the catalyst for her becoming sober. Grandma Barbara asks Kate about her plans. Kate says that after she gets Esther settled, she will go back to teaching piano. Lennington 62 Mother, May I (Die)? However, she will have to give lessons from home since she had to quit her job at Yale, presumably due to her alcoholism—which is something Barbara comments on; using a term that is popular is associated with Alcoholics Anonymous. Kate becomes defensive at this remark, and says that she just quit drinking and never went to AA. That night Kate tries to initiate sex with her husband. However, there is a storm, which arouses Esther. Esther stops in Max’s room and wakes her up. The two girls go to John and Kate’s room, interrupting them. Esther asks if the girls can sleep there tonight as the lightning kept them awake. Esther wants to sleep next to her new adoptive father. Esther dresses oddly for her first day of school, wearing a ruffled dress that is far too nice for the occasion. When Esther is introduced the class one of her peers, a girl named Brenda (Jamie Young) immediately teases her about her appearance. Esther just glares at the girl as she takes her seat. Later that day, at home, Esther pulls Max in a sled over the ice-covered lake. Kate runs out of the house screaming about the danger of the water and ordering the girls to stop. Meanwhile, Danny is shooting a paintball gun at a target in further away in the yard. He shoots a bird and is immediately remorseful. Esther and Max walk up to him and they all look at the bird. Danny claims tearfully that he never meant to harm the creature. Esther tells him that it is his responsibility to kill the injured bird. She hands him a rock. When he is unable to kill the bird, Esther does it instead. That night Esther locks the bathroom door when she wants to take a shower. Kate tells her that there are no locked doors in the house. Esther is concerned someone might enter. Kate offers to stand guard and Esther sings to let Kate know that she is alright, Kate lets her lock the door just for this one night. While Esther sings, Kate puts laundry away. She struggles to open one of Esther’s drawers and finds a Bible that is held together by rubber bands. She pulls a torn picture out of the Bible and sees that it is of a man. She hurriedly puts the Bible away before Esther can come in and discover her in the room. The next day at school, Danny and his friends, see Esther in the hallway. One of his friends comments about how weird she is and Danny knocks the books out of her hands as she passes him. Brenda, Esther’s bully snatches up the Bible before Esther can get to it. She makes fun of Esther for being a religious freak. Esther grabs for the book but it ends up falling to the ground, scattering pages all over the floor. Esther bends down to collect them. Brenda tries to remove the ribbon from her neck and Esther screams. At home, Esther receives a piano lesson from Kate. Kate attempts to talk to Esther about the incident in the hallway, but Esther is reluctant. Kate gives the girl a gift. It’s a scrapbook that Kate has already placed a few photos in—the rest is for the two of them to do together. Esther Lennington 63 Mother, May I (Die)? then asks her about Jessica and Kate takes her to the greenhouse and shows her a white rosebush. They had Jessica’s ashes scattered in the pot so that as long as the roses are growing, there is a part of her daughter still alive. Esther tearfully tells Kate that she is a wonderful mother. Kate embraces her. Later that evening Kate cleans up the kitchen. Her husband comes in and the two become intimate, since the children are supposed to be asleep. They have mostly disrobed and are obviously in the act, when Esther spots them. The blanket, which concealed them the first time they were interrupted by Esther, is absent. This prompts Kate to discuss with Esther what she saw. Esther seems unfazed as Kate tries to explain intercourse between adults in terms that are appropriate for a child. Esther cuts her off by saying, “I know, they fuck” (ibid.). Kate is appalled by the profanity and discusses it with her husband. She wants to send the girl to see Dr. Browning to discuss it and expresses concern about the influence Esther might have on the other children. John discourages this idea, and says that one bad word is nothing to worry about her. Kate settles for John spending more time with the girl and getting to know her better. John takes Esther and Max to the park. Esther sits on a swing and stares at John as a neighbor woman comes by to flirt with him. She asks if he could come by and move a chair. John is polite, but does not respond to the flirting, informing the woman, that he and his wife would be happy to help. Esther spots Brenda playing on a play structure. She disappears to go find her bully. Brenda is aware that Esther is somewhere nearby and worriedly looks for her. Esther finds Brenda first and pushes her off the play structure. Max witnesses this. Later at the dinner table, John informs Esther that Brenda’s dad called to say that Esther pushed Brenda. Esther denies this. John then asks Max if she saw anything and Max lies about it, signing that the girl slipped. Before eating dinner, Esther prays silently, a gesture, which Max copies. Max signs something to her brother. Danny asks his mother what it means, but Esther explains that his sister his asking for the bread and butter. Irate, Danny tells Esther that he was not asking her. He reveals that his friends have been making fun of him because of Esther. John tells him to be nicer to his sister and Danny replies with, “She’s not my fucking sister” (ibid.). During this dinner, interaction Esther’s influence over the children has become clear. Danny is using the word that his mother feared would spread to the lexicon of her other kids after she heard Esther use it so nonchalantly, and Max is already lying for Esther and copying her habits. John punishes Danny by locking him out of his treehouse until he apologizes. Kate, Esther and Max are shopping when Kate receives a call from Sister Abigail. Kate is put off by Esther’s firm refusal to say hello to Sister Abigail. She sends the girl to select some apples while she walks out of earshot. Esther makes Max read Kate’s lips and sign what she is Lennington 64 Mother, May I (Die)? saying. Kate reveals that she is suspicious that Esther might have indeed pushed Brenda on the playground, which resulted in a broken ankle for the girl. She also talks about the problems with Esther’s language. Later that day, at home, Kate hears expert level piano playing. She goes to investigate and discovers that Esther is no beginner. She asks the girl why she lied. Esther claims that she never lied; she just wanted the time with Kate. Kate is unsatisfied with this answer. Esther comments about what a disappointment it must be for such a talented musician to have an apathetic son and deaf daughter. Esther rushes away before Kate can speak with her more. Kate discusses this incident with her husband. He does not take her seriously, believing that Esther only lied with the innocent intention of getting more quality time with her new mother. This is the second instance in the film where John has dismissed Kate’s concerns about Esther. This time, however, Kate is offended. Her suspicions of the girl have greatly increased. She explains that John does not know Esther like she does, since Esther acts more innocently around him. She brings up the playground incident again. John is still skeptical, calling it an accident. Kate becomes annoyed and sarcastically proclaims that she will just take the girl at her word, starting with what she said about him and the neighbor woman. Esther claimed that John had been hitting on the neighbor. John just laughs it off and says that the girl must have misunderstood. The fight darkens from here. John apparently cheated on Kate ten years ago and is annoyed that she still does not trust him. Kate, however only found out two years ago. John then brings up her alcoholism and says that if he could give her another chance after that, that she should be able to give him another chance. Again, the lake incident is referred to, where Kate almost let Max drown because she was too drunk to notice the girl was in danger. John says no one would have blamed him for leaving her at that point. Esther can hear the argument from her room and smiles faintly to herself as she paints. Esther is the one to answer the door when Sister Abigail visits. Her face falls at the sight of the woman. When Sister Abigail sits down with John and Kate, she explains that she might have made a mistake in letting them take Esther. Esther is never caught in wrongdoing, but an inordinate amount of strange and violent instances seem to take place around her. Her last family’s house was destroyed by arson and the culprit was never caught. John dismisses this and does not believe that Esther could do anything bad. When Kate attempts to inform Sister Abigail about the odd behavior that she has seen from Esther, her husband firmly shuts her down. At the end of the interaction, however, he does concede to take the girl to therapy. Esther has heard this interaction. She enlists the help of Max against Sister Abigail, warning Max that this woman will take her away if they do not do something. The girls go to Lennington 65 Mother, May I (Die)? the garage where Max finds her father’s keys. Esther takes a hammer from the wall and uses the keys to open a gun safe. She loads the gun with confidence and then points the gun at Max, asking her if she would like to play. Esther hears Sister Abigail leaving so she and Max hurry and wait by a bridge near the house for the nun to drive by. Esther tells Max that they will only scare the woman so bad that she will never come back. Max goes out into the middle of the road. Sister Abigail swerves her car into a ditch to avoid her. She runs from the car to check on the girl and Esther hits her on the head with a hammer. She forces Max to help her drag the nun away from the road. Once out of sight from passing cars, Esther bludgeons the nun to death while Max watches in horror. Esther hides her bloody clothes and the hammer under the loose floorboard in Danny’s treehouse. She informs Max that is she tells anyone, she will also go to jail because she helped Esther. Esther insists that they had to kill Sister Abigail then she embraces and tells her she loves her. Danny witnesses the girls leaving the treehouse. This does not go unnoticed by Esther who wakes the boy up in the middle of the night with a box cutter to his throat. She demands to know what he saw. She scares him so badly that he wets the bed. She leaves once she is satisfied that all he saw was the girls exiting the treehouse and that he will not tell anyone of the activity. Esther goes to Dr. Browning’s office. At the end of her session, she walks out and warmly tells the therapist that she hopes they can be friends. Dr. Browning smiles at the girl, then calls the parents in for their session. In her opinion, there is nothing wrong with Esther; however, there could be something wrong with her relationship with Kate. She says that Kate has been hindering opportunities to bond with the girl. Kate is taken aback and turns to her husband for support. When he offers none, she moves away from him on the couch. She listens appalled as Dr. Browning explains: “Perhaps it is your guilt about drinking or what happened to Max, maybe some of your feelings of inadequacy as a mother are manifesting themselves in your relationship with Esther” (ibid.). Kate immediately takes offense at this, but John simply fidgets in his seat. Meanwhile Esther is in the bathroom screaming and kicking at the stall walls. Once home, Esther rushes into the house. Kate is annoyed with her husband, but she simply says that what the psychiatrist said had merit. At that moment, Kate receives a phone call and John goes inside. Another nun from the orphanage is calling, concerned for Sister Abigail. The police come and discover Sister Abigail’s body. Meanwhile Esther is in her room turning her light on and off. There is a black light from her fish tank, which reveals disturbing images only visible with the normal light off. Kate researches personality disorders and children who kill. She confronts her husband with her findings. Explaining symptoms that line up exceptionally well with Esther’s behavior. John still refuses to believe his wife. He asks her if she intends to show her findings to Dr. Lennington 66 Mother, May I (Die)? Browning but Kate expresses reluctance toward ever seeing her again. John again suggests that Browning had worthwhile points. Kate asks why everyone gets the benefit of the doubt except for her. John, thinking this is something to do with her being overwhelmed by her responsibilities as a mother offers to hire help. Kate says that she at least wants to know more about Esther and where she came from. The next day, Kate calls the orphanage in Russia where Esther is supposedly from, but there is no record of her there. Esther has a dentist appointment that she does not want to go to. John, seeing a chance to bond with the girl offers to let her stay home and they could draw together instead. Kate drives her children to school and uses the opportunity to talk to her children about Esther. Max and Danny fearfully deny any misgiving about their adopted sister. While spending time with John, Esther expresses how much she enjoys her time with him and how she thinks that he’s a wonderful dad. She feels however, that Kate does not really love her, but she understands that it must be hard for a mother to love an adopted child as much as their biological ones. Esther is displaying exactly the kind of manipulative characteristics that Kate previously tried to point out to John, but he is taken in regardless. He suggests that Esther do something nice for Kate. Kate is looking in the fridge when Esther enters the kitchen sweetly saying that she has a surprise for her and that she picked them herself. Kate turns around and Esther reveals a bouquet of white roses. Kate is horrified and grabs Esther, yelling at her. Esther screams. John comes in and pulls Esther away saying it was his fault for suggesting Esther do something nice and that the girl did not know what she was doing. Kate runs off to the greenhouse to check on the rosebush. She sobs as she realizes the plant is beyond saving. Esther goes into the garage and breaks her arm with a vice. In bed that night, she whimpers and calls out to John. He takes her to the hospital and blames the injury on Kate. That night he lets Esther sleep in his bed and tells Kate to sleep downstairs. Kate tries to explain that she did not grab Esther hard enough to cause such an injury, but again she is ignored. Kate goes to the liquor store and buys two bottles of wine. She pours herself a glass but decides against drinking out of it. She pours the glass out and the rest of the bottle down the drain.
Kate drives the kids to school the next day. Danny’s backpack breaks as he ascends the steps and Kate exits the car to help him. Esther goes releases the parking brake on the car. Max is still inside as the car starts rolling backwards. Kate runs after it, screaming. The car eventually ends up in a snowbank with Max unhurt. That evening Dr. Brown visits Kate and John at their house. She accuses Kate of blaming Esther for her mistakes. John informs her the girls discovered the wine bottles in the trash. One Lennington 67 Mother, May I (Die)? of them is still full, untouched, but the other is empty. Kate explains that she did not drink anything. She is only sober for her children. She wants to die when she looks at the pond and thinks about what could have happened if John had not been there. She literally begs John to believe her, but John will not. She has a week before he sends her to rehabilitation; otherwise he will take the kids and leave her. Danny finally confronts his sister about Esther, saying that they need to tell their parents. He discovers that the evidence of Sister Abigail’s murder is in his tree house under the floorboard. He goes up there only to find that the evidence has been removed. Esther comes in after him and drops the hammer and bloody dress on the floor before covering them with lighter fluid. She sets the treehouse on fire and leaves Danny in there. She watches as he struggles to get out. Danny is screaming for his mother. While this is happening, Kate is inside. While investigating Esther’s room she had come across the Bible again. She discovered other torn picture fragments of men and there was a stamp on the inside cover from the Saarne Institute. She contacts the Saarne Institute and learns that it is not an orphanage in Russia but a mental institution in Estonia. She sends them a picture, thinking maybe that Esther was born there. Kate finally realizes that Danny is in danger. She runs outside to help her son who has fallen from the burning treehouse trying to escape. Esther had been on her way to drop a rock on his head when Max stops her. Kate is beside herself. Danny ends up being sent to the ICU. As the family sits in the waiting room, they are informed that he might not remember what happened when he wakes up. Grandma Barbara is there and John and Kate leave the children with her while they go off to have a private discussion. John still will not believe Kate that there is something wrong with Esther. Even after she explains that, she came from a mental institution. This is not the only film analyzed within this thesis to present a mental care facility as something threatening. This is also an important aspect in the film, Lights Out, which is discussed in the Mentally Vulnerable chapter of this thesis. Frustrated, Kate says that she will leave on the condition that Esther comes with her. She wants to protect her children. While John and Kate are away, Esther asks Grandma Barbara for a dollar for the soda machine. She goes to Danny’s room and places his heart monitor on her finger. She removes his oxygen masks and smothers him with a pillow. Once he stops fighting, she replaces the mask and the monitor. Danny goes into cardiac arrest and doctors are called to the ICU. Upon hearing this, Kate and John sprint to the room and watch as their son is resuscitated. Kate spots Esther and slaps her. She is pulled away from the girl by several doctors and is sedated. Upon waking, she sees her husband standing over her. She asks about Danny. John says that Danny will be fine and allowed to come home in a few days. Kate has to spend the night at the hospital and Lennington 68 Mother, May I (Die)? John is going to take the girls home. Kate begs him to keep Esther away from Max before she drifts into unconsciousness again. John tucks Max into bed, reassuring her about her brother. Esther comes in to give her a kiss goodnight and takes the hearing aids from the bedside table as she does so. John goes downstairs and drinks from the bottle of wine his wife did not pour down the drain. Meanwhile, Esther dresses in a nightgown meant for an adult woman, which she rips to a length that will fit her. She puts on makeup. She then approaches John with a knife and a cutting board full of fruit and cheese. John is drunk and confused but horrified by her trying to seduce him. He lashes out and says he cannot take it anymore and will call the orphanage the next day. Esther storms off and starts tearing her room apart. Kate is awoken from a call from the Saarne Institute. She learns that Esther is actually a thirty-three year old woman named Lena with a condition that makes her appear young she is responsible for at least seven murders and has posed as a child before in order to get adopted. She attempts to seduce the fathers in her adoptive families and when they rebuff her advances, she kills the family. She has distinctive scars on her neck and wrists from the sheer amount of time she spent struggling in a straitjacket. Kate, still under the influence of the sedatives rushes off to her car, trying desperately to reach her husband. She drives dangerously on the snowy road. She calls the police. Meanwhile at home, Esther has stabbed John to death, which Max witnessed. Max runs off to hide while Esther retrieves the gun. Kate is so desperate to get home that she does not even brake when she gets home. She just crashes the car into the house. She discovers her husband dead on the floor and after a moment of lamentation, she gets up and begins her search for Max. In her desperation to save her daughter, Kate endures a gunshot wound, freezing cold temperatures without appropriate clothing and falling through the glass ceiling of the greenhouse. The climax brings Max, Kate and Ester to the frozen pond. Max watches from the shore and Kate and Esther struggle on the ice before it breaks, plunging them into the water. Kate is slashed with a knife, receiving further injury as she struggles with Esther. Kate emerges from the water but Esther clings to her asking her mommy not to kill her. Kate kicks Esther away with the words, “I’m not your fucking mommy” (ibid). Esther appears to have broken her neck and Kate walks away into the woods toward the approaching police officers, carrying her daughter.
4.1.2 Discussion of Orphan
Kate endures dire bodily harm in her attempts to rescue her daughter. Like Esther, she is capable of withstanding injuries that would likely incapacitate anyone else. Where Esther’s Lennington 69 Mother, May I (Die)? unnatural strength is driven by hate, Kate’s is driven by love. Kate is ultimately able to beat Esther because the film implies that the love of a mother is stronger than even the unnatural strength of a crazed killer. Despite the casualties, Orphan ends happily. John is punished for his hubris in not trusting his wife. She begged him to take her seriously, but he ignored her. This ultimately leads to his bloody downfall.
4.1.3 Poltergeist
Tobe Hooper’s Poltergeist26 (1982), produced and written in part by Steven Spielberg, follows the Freeling family, who seem to fulfil a sort of American ideal. The film begins with a close-up of a television playing the national anthem as the broadcast is ending for the night. Steve Freeling (Craig T. Nelson) sleeps in a chair. The audience is introduced by a tracking shot following the family dog. First he visits the mother of the family, Diane Freeling (JoBeth Williams) sleeping in her bed, then he ventures into the eldest daughter, Dana’s (Dominique Dunne) and then ends up in the room of the youngest children, Robbie (Oliver Robin) and Carol Anne (Heather O’ Rourke). The camera zooms in on the sleeping Carol Anne and she wakes up. She goes downstairs and begins conversing with the television. She has trouble hearing so she begins to shout, waking up her mother and father. The next day reveals that the Freeling house is in an idyllic neighborhood. Kids ride around on bikes, it is sunny; the houses are big and nice. It is the very picture of upper-middle class utopia. Steve is having friends over to watch the football game on the television. Diane is doing chores, making Carol Anne’s bed when she realizes that her pet bird has died. She good naturedly chides it for not having waited until a school day. Downstairs Steve gets into a fight with the neighbor as their remotes interfere with each other’s televisions and the neighbor kids want to watch a kid’s show. This suburban American stereotype comes complete with annoying neighbors. Diane is about to flush Carol Anne’s bird but is caught by the little girl and forced to have a burial instead. Carol Anne is upset and places little items in the bird’s shoe box coffin in order to make it more comfortable. The children all attend the bird funeral, and important characterizations take place for each of those present. Diane is the loving mother who has to bury the bird. Dana, the teenage daughter thinks the situation is ridiculous and laughs as her sister says a prayer in commemoration. Robbie, the middle child, asks if they can dig the bird up in after some time has passed in order to check out the bones as it rots. Carol Ann, after the ceremony is over, brightly asks her mother if she can get a goldfish.
26 Hooper, Tobe, director. Poltergeist. Metro-Goldwyn Mayer, 1982. Lennington 70 Mother, May I (Die)? In the next scene, Carol Anne is feeding a goldfish in the room she shares with her brother. There is lightning outside and Robbie stares fearfully at the tree outside his window, which appears to have arms and a face. Diane comes to tuck her youngest two children into bed. She leaves the closet light on at Carol Anne’s insistence. She then joins her husband in bed where she smokes what appears to be marijuana and he reads a book and watches television at the same time. Diane is reading an article about somnambulism and recalls an entertaining sleepwalking story from her childhood, but worries about her Carol Anne sleepwalking into the pool, as she seems to have inherited the trait. Her husband jokes around with her and soothes her fears. They are a happy, functional couple. Back in Robbie and Carol Anne’s room, Carol Anne stares at her fish while her brother stares at a clown doll sitting on a chair facing him. He throws a blanket over it, trying to keep it from appearing to stare at him. Lightning flashes and Robbie is frightened. He goes to his parents’ room and interrupts them as they giggle in bed. Steve takes Robbie back to his bed and teaches him a trick to help him know that the storm is moving away. He just has to count how long it takes the thunder to sound after seeing the lightning and if it takes longer each time, the storm is moving away. Steve leaves the boy in bed as he counts. There is a particularly loud crash of thunder and the two youngest children end up spending the night in their parents’ bed. The TV is left on in the room and when the broadcasting for the day is over, the screen turns to static. Carol Anne wakes up and crawls toward the television. There are flashing lights in the static, Carol Anne puts her hands on the television and a ghostly hand emerges from the television, hovering over the family in bed. It then turns into a beam, which goes into the wall. There is a sudden earthquake and everyone is awake. Carol Anne simply says, “They’re here” (ibid.). The next morning Steve calls the insurance company about the earthquake while Diane helps the children with breakfast. She asks Carol Anne what she meant the night previous and Carol Anne just calls them, “The TV people” (ibid.). The kids are bickering playfully at the kitchen table when Robbie’s glass explodes. Dana is annoyed and has to go and change. When Robbie attempts to finish his breakfast, his silverware is bent. Everyone leaves except for Carol Anne and Diane. Diane is a stay-at-home mom. As she cheerfully goes about her duties, she becomes aware that the kitchen chairs are moving of their own accord. Instead of being terrified by this, she is fascinated. She simply asks Carol Anne if the TV people did it. She spends the day experimenting before her husband comes home from work, where he sells houses in the development he helped create. She excitedly greets him as soon as he steps out of the car, eager to show him what she’s just discovered. She has marked a path on ground and places a chair at the beginning of it. The chair slides along the path. Diane Lennington 71 Mother, May I (Die)? even demonstrates with Carol Anne. Her husband is just overwhelmed. There is an odd, jarring jump-cut in the middle of dialogue where suddenly Steve and Diane are giggling outside of their neighbor’s house, getting bitten by mosquitos. They are barely coherent as they ask if anything weird has been going on for the neighbors. Before the neighbor answers there is another jump cut and Steve and Diane are home in their bathroom treating their bug bites. This sequence establishes them further as a fun-loving couple. The odd cuts imply an altered state of mind, possibly brought on by recreational drugs. Steve mentions that he does not really want anyone in the kitchen until they know more about what is going on. That night there is another lightning storm. Robbie lies in bed frantically counting as a tree branch crashes through his window and pulls him out of his bed. He starts screaming. Steve, Diane, and Dana all run outside to help Robbie who is about to be devoured by the tree. Carol Anne, alone in the room ends up being sucked into her closet as a bright light emanates from it. Once Robbie is rescued from the tree, a tornado appears and simply blows it away. Finally, they realize that Carol Anne is not with them. A frantic search commences. Steve will not let Dana in the kitchen to look, however. Robbie ends up in his parent’s room where he hears Carol-Anne’s voice coming from the television, calling for her mother. He yells and Diane comes running. She is overjoyed at the sound of her daughter’s voice but then realizes that her daughter is somewhere unreachable. Instead of informing the police of his daughter’s disappearance Steve seeks out the help of Dr. Lesh (Beatrice Straight) and her assistants who are paranormal experts. He wants to enlist their help in finding his daughter, who, the audience finds out, was born in the house. It’s also revealed that Diane is quite young. Steve discusses the ages of his family members, and it turns out that Diane is only thirty-two and she gave birth to Dana when she was sixteen. The paranormal investigators some to the house and quickly discover that the paranormal activity taking place in the house is far more intense than any they had ever seen before. Carol Anne’s and Robbie’s room is filled with floating, spiraling objects, and lights flicker in the rest of the house. Dr. Lesh shakes as she drinks tea at the Freeling’s kitchen table. She explains that it seems to be the work of a poltergeist rather than a haunting, since poltergeists are more likely to center on living people as opposed places, where hauntings tend to be focused. Diane demonstrates how she communicates with Carol Anne. She turns on the television and calls out to her daughter. She asks Carol Anne to say hello to her daddy, which she does, but it seems that Diane is the main communicator with the child. Carol Anne asks where everyone is. She is afraid of the light. Dr. Lesh tells Diane to instruct her daughter away from the light. There is a strange cloud, which forms near the ceiling and various pieces of jewelry fall out. Carol Anne is frightened, saying that someone is coming. Diane is distraught and begs Lennington 72 Mother, May I (Die)? Dr. Lesh to help. Diane starts walking to the stairs and something passes through her. Diane can feel that it’s her daughter. She exclaims ecstatically that she can smell the child. She proclaims, “She went through my soul” (ibid.). Suddenly there is a thudding noise and Carol Anne can’t be heard anymore. Dr. Lesh asks where Carol Anne was when she disappeared. Diane informs her that she was in her room. An unseen force bit one of Dr. Lesh’s assistants and it left a large mark on his body. Steve wants the family to spend the night in a hotel but Diane refuses to leave without Carol Anne. Dana spends the night at a friend’s house, but Steve, Diane and Robbie sleep in the living room. Steve sleeps alone in a chair while Diane and Robbie sleep together, near the TV with the static on so they can hear Carol Anne. Robbie will be going to his grandmother’s soon so he can be away from the house. Dr. Lesh and her assistants also spend the night, they speak of the phenomena and of a concept called “bilocation”. Dr. Lesh and Diane end up having a conversation. Diane is a little embarrassed for how ridiculous the situation is and Dr. Lesh admits that it is odd that she has such a time consuming hobby as a professional psychologist. Dr. Lesh admits that she is terrified. The woman form a bond. Robbie leaves with the dog the next morning before breakfast. Diane tearfully bids him farewell and requests that he call her. At table Dr. Lesh examines the jewelry that fell from the ceiling the previous night. The pieces come from different periods of time and don’t seem to have any relation to each other. She says she will take them back to the lab to investigate. She also announces that she will be leaving and the assistant who was bitten and had a nightmare in which he tore his own face off in the bathroom mirror will not be returning. She, however, will be back with help. Diane embraces her gratefully. Steve’s Boss stops by the house as phenomena occurs all around. Mr. Teague seems oblivious to it. Steve has missed a lot of work recently and the two take a walk together up a hill where they end up at a graveyard. Mr. Teague explains that he wants to expand development beyond the valley and up onto the hill. He even says that as a man responsible for 42% of sales, it would be a great place for Steve to build a new family home. Mr. Teague mentions that they could move the graveyard in order to build houses up there. Steve is originally appalled, considering it to be sacrilege. The boss laughs this off, saying that at least it was not an old Native American Burial ground. He adds, “Besides, we’ve done it before” (ibid.). Steve asks him about when this happened and Mr. Teague says that they moved the graveyard when they built the houses in the valley. Steve had no idea about it. He is distracted but eventually vaguely agrees that it would be possible to do it again. Later that day it Dr. Lesh has returned, this time with one assistant and an authoritative woman named Tangina (Zelda Rubinstein). Tangina has experience in “cleaning” houses where Lennington 73 Mother, May I (Die)? paranormal activity has taken place. She walks around the house as Diane explains to her what has been going on. Marcus follows along with a camera, recording everything. Tangina suddenly stops and brings her hands to her chest. She heads upstairs and upon reaching the door the youngest children’s bedroom, she asks why it is locked. Lesh responds by saying that she believes it is to the “heart” of the house. To which Tangina replies that the house has “many hearts.” Tangina descends the stairs and asks For Diane to come close and give her her hand. She assures that Carol Anne is alive and inside the house. Steve is sitting apart from them, at a table with a drink in hand. Although he is invested, he is not as involved as Diane is. Diane sobs and hugs Tangina. Tagina believes the center of the activity is the closet in the upstairs bedroom, confirming what had already been established several times throughout the film. Tangina tells Diane: T: You have to be strong for me and your daughter. I can do absolutely nothing without your faith in this world and your love for your children. D: I will, believe me I will. T: Will you do anything I ask, even if it comes contrary to your beliefs as a human being and a Christian? D: I promise, please (ibid.). Tangina kisses Diane and continues on to explain that Carol Anne is a distraction from the real light that the spirits are supposed to be heading into. When discussing the nature of what Carol Anne is going through Tangina states: “Carol Anne must help them cross over and she will only hear her mother’s voice” (Poltergeist, 1982). Diane is still on the floor in front of Tangina. At these words a couple of tears Spill out of Steve’s eyes. To Diane’s great upset, Tangina explains that there is a dark force keeping Carol Anne close and using her to restrain others. Tangina rallies Diane my emphatically saying, “Now let’s go get your daughter” (ibid). The only time when Steve’s voice is needed is when Carol Anne, manipulated by the dark force stops responding, Tangina asks for the disciplinarian to scare Carol Anne away from the dark force following her. He resents the implication that he would be the parent more likely to frighten his daughter into answering. He reluctantly threatens her with punishment and when Carol Anne’s voice does ring out again, it is to call for her mother. A plan is formulated for Carol Anne’s retrieval. They test the portal using tennis balls tossed in the closet. Once they emerge, covered in pink slime from the ceiling downstairs the intention is to tie someone up with a rope and to grip it as someone goes in after Carol Anne in order to pull her out. Tangina originally intends to go into the closet herself to retrieve Carol Anne, but Diane will not allow it. It takes very little convincing for Tangina to agree to this, Lennington 74 Mother, May I (Die)? although Steve wants to go in her place. Diane explains that she needs someone strong enough to hold the rope. After kissing Steve, she goes in herself to rescue her daughter. She and Carol Anne emerge from the ceiling covered in pink slime. Steve carries them to the bathroom where they both wake up. Steve weeps in relief. Tangina declares the house clean. However, she is wrong on this front. The family decide to move. Steve goes to work one last time with the intention of quitting. Dana spends the day with a friend. Diane decides to dye back to brown, two gray streaks of hair, which appeared after she rescued her daughter. She tells Danny and Carol Anne that she will be in the bathroom for a while and they should take care of themselves until she comes back out. While the children are alone in their room, the phenomena starts up again. Danny’s clown doll attacks him and the closet door opens and starts to suck the contents of the room back into it. Diana hears what is going on and rushes to her the aid if her children. Once she reaches the door, a giant face prevents her from entering. She runs screaming for help into the backyard and ends up slipping into the pool. Corpses spring up around her n the filthy water. She tries desperately to escape the muddy pool in order to get back to Danny and Carol Anne. She manages to claw her way out with the help of her neighbors. She runs back into the house and manages to rescue her children. Steve arrives home in a car with Mr. Teague and screams at him, realizing that the man only moved the gravestones and not the bodies. The family desperately scramble into their car. As they drive away, their house is sucked away into nothingness. At the hotel, Steve pushes the television out of the room.
4.1.4 Discussion of Poltergeist
What makes Diane a Warrior is the fact that she spends most of the movie desperately trying to save her kids. Steve, although a good father, does not have the same connection to the children that she does. There is actually evidence in the film that he might be jealous of the closeness that Diane shares with their children—when he sheds tears at the fact that his daughter will only respond to her mother’s voice. He is indignant when it is established that he is the more frightening parent, and that is the only time when he is directly useful—when he tells Carol Anne to flee or otherwise face a spanking. Even when Carol Anne responds to that, she does so by calling out for her mother. When it comes time to go in and save Carol Anne, he wants to protect his wife and go in himself, but she flatly will not allow it. The life of the Freelings falls very much in line with the ideals of middle class America. They are a functional family. There seems to be no real conflict The kids bicker amongst Lennington 75 Mother, May I (Die)? themselves but it is employed as a device to endear the audience to the viewer. Each member of the family seems to fit comfortably in their role and they all trust each other. Even when Diane notices the supernatural events starting to occur within the home, Steve believes her immediately. There is no point in the film where Diane has to beg her husband to listen to her. This is, however, not the case for Orphan. The tension in this story comes from the ease with which their comfortable family functioning is destroyed when their house turns against them. However, for Diane’s particular manifestation of motherhood, her family is far more important than her home. She appears to enjoy doing the housework while her husband is away but she is so relieved to have the family together at the end that it doesn't even matter that domicile aspect of her domestic life literally vanishes into a vortex. When Carol Anne passes through her mother, it is a kind of birth. She felt the girl in her soul. The girl had passed through her on the way to being born the first time. It is also of importance that Carol Anne is the only child to have been conceived in the house. A new life created in the midst of death is indicative of the blurred boundaries between life and death. Since Diane is the one who carried Carol Anne into the world once by birthing her, it seems only natural that she carry her daughter out of the dark world, which she gets sucked into. Orphan displays a different take on the Warrior. Kate does not fit quite so easily into her role as a mother. She loves her children dearly, but before the events of the film, she had endangered them due to her struggles with alcoholism. Her relationship with her husband is fraught with mistrust. In fact, this mistrust leads to the demise of John. (In fact, Jack Torrance’s reluctance to listen to his wife also contributed to his doom in The Shining.) Max is extremely vulnerable. Not only is she the youngest child, but she is also deaf. When Esther takes her hearing aids away before the climax—thus exploiting her disability, Max becomes even more helpless. John not only failed to notice that Esther took the hearing aids, but when he finally realized that Esther was not the innocent little girl he so adamantly believed she was, he is immediately killed. His death is remarkably easy in comparison to the power that Esther seems to exhibit and the bodily harm, which Kate survives in order to save her little girl.
4.2 The Saint
The Saint is a mother who has died before the events of the film take place. Her absence is felt in the movie. In contrast to the Corrupting Mother influences that a dead mother like Mrs. Bates from Psycho (1960) or Arlette from 1922 (2018), this mother does not lead her children to destruction. She acts as subtle and saving grace within the film
Lennington 76 Mother, May I (Die)? In the 2107 film Get Out27, directed by Jordan Peele, the mother of the protagonist, Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) is dead. By virtue of being deceased, she cannot possess power and her influence on the film is subtly shown by the active love that her son still feels for her. The film follows Chris as he goes on a weekend trip to meet the family of his girlfriend, Rose Armitage (Allison Williams). Once there the family acts oddly and it is revealed that through a process involving hypnosis and surgery, the Armitage family is actually taking the consciousness of Caucasians close to death and putting them into the bodies of Black people. There is a scene in which Chris is hypnotized in order to force his subconscious into the “sunken place”, where he loses control of his body—making it easier for him later to become a vessel for a white man. The only memory powerful enough to sink him is the one of night when his mother died. He was just a child watching television with a growing sense of unease waiting for a mother who would never come home. She dies in a hit and run accident and Chris experiences guilt for not having alerted the authorities. He just sat there, afraid of confronting reality and it became his biggest regret. His mother may have survived if he had reached out someone had gone looking for her. Chris’s father was never really a part of his life, but he loves and misses his mother dearly. Later in the plot, Chris hits a black woman with a car as he is trying to escape. This woman is actually inhabited by the consciousness of Rose’s grandmother. Chris, however, cannot bear the sight of an injured black woman lying on the ground. He saves her and places her unconscious in the front seat of the car. The woman eventually wakes up and grabs the steering wheel, forcing the car to crash off of the the road. Rose has followed Chris and she has brought a gun. There is a fight and ultimately Rose is shot by the Black Man whom her grandfather is possessing. Chris ends up alone on the side of the road, surrounded by corpses. Chris is ultimately rescued by his best friend. Throughout the film, the audience sees the growing unease experienced by Rod (Lil Rel Howrey), as he worried for Chris. Once Chris becomes unreachable, Rod acts where Chris did not. Since Rod is close to Chris, it is not unreasonable to assume that Rod knows the story of the Chris’s mother. In this way, Chris’s mother is acts as an Saint. She is not embodied. She possessed no abnormal powers and her death was heartbreakingly mundane. Her normal human love and her loss as a normal woman encourages Chris and Rod to be better. She did not possess a superhuman capability to save her son; she was not strong enough to survive and fight to keep her son safe. It is this particular
27 Peele, Jordan, director. Get Out. Universal PIctures Home Entertainment, 2017. Lennington 77 Mother, May I (Die)? mother, and not motherhood itself, which acts as a hero. It is also vital to note that of all the films noted in this thesis, Chris’s mother is the only Woman of Color. Another example of a deceased mother comes from the 2016 horror film, The Shallows28, directed by Jaume Collet-Serra. Nancy (Blake Lively) is a young woman who has recently taken leave from medical school, due to the grief of having lost her mother. She decides to visit and surf a beach where her mother had surfed before Nancy was born. The beach is a secret location only known to locals. She only knows what it looks like thanks to a picture of her mother standing in the sand with a distinctive island in the background of the shot. She finds it thanks to help from a kindly stranger. She was supposed to visit this beach with a friend, but due to overindulging on alcohol the night before, the friend does not accompany Nancy. Upon arriving at the beach, Nancy remarks that the distinctive island resembles a pregnant woman due to its shape—which is an obvious connection to her lost mother. She calls her younger sister to inform her that she found the beach but her dad who wants Nancy to come home and continue her medical training takes the phone away from her. Nancy cuts call the call short and commences to surf. She ends up getting stranded by a shark in the water. She is grievously injured by the shark and tends to her own wounds. Once she finally makes it back to shore, she is resuscitated. When she looks up at her savior, the first thing she sees is her mother, but this is revealed to be a hallucination she is actually rescued by the kindly stranger who drove her to the beach in the first place. There is a flash forward to a year later. Nancy is back home and at a beach with her sister who refers to her as “Dr. Nancy”. Nancy, with a large scar on her leg commences to surf. Nancy’s own brush with death brought her closer to her mother. The secret beach was tied inexorably with her memory. She even saw her mother when she was at her closest to death. Once she gets home, she finishes medical school and she is spending time with her family. Nancy’s mother is the Saint of the story. It is heavily implied that the connection that Nancy had with her allowed her to not only survive, but to get her life back on track once she got home.
5 Corrupting Mothers
Corrupting Mothers are the villains of their films. Either their role as mother is disturbed by a disruption in the family structure, or they are not particularly good at being mothers. In The
28 Collet-Serra, Jaume, director. The Shallows. Columbia Pictures, 2016. Lennington 78 Mother, May I (Die)? Monstrous Feminine, Barbara Creed asserts, “I will argue that when a woman is represented as monstrous it is almost always in relation to her mothering and reproductive functions. These faces are: the archaic mother; the monstrous womb; the witch; the vampire; and the possessed woman” (Creed 297). Barbara Creed also speaks to the abjection of the womb as it represents “inside/outside” (Creed 1160). The mother who brought her child into the world is perhaps capable of pulling it back out. There the mothers who are the villains due to a hyperbolic manifestation of motherly qualities. They are too protective of their children to the point of fanatical obsession. They become monsters out of a warped devotion to their children (Carrie, Friday the 13th). A mother can also become monstrous based on her inability to satisfy the role of mother (1922).
5.1 Corrupting Mother
The original Friday the 13th29 was directed by Sean S. Cunningham in 1980 and follows a group of teenagers as they prepare a summer camp. The camp had been previously closed due to the drowning death of a child, which occurred years previously. The people associated with the camp meet their ends, one by one, in bloody ways. The only person who survives the ordeal is a girl named Alice (Adrienne King). She believes she has finally found safety when she encounters a warm, motherly woman. She even goes to embrace her, seeking comfort after the bloody demise of all of her friends. This woman is Mrs. Voorhees (Betsey Palmer) and she is actually the killer and the mother of the boy who drowned at the camp. After a bloody fight, Alice manages to kill her. Mrs. Voorhees is an example of a corrupting mother whose love for her child becomes dangerous. When she is revealed as the killer, it subverts expectations because she simply looks like a friendly woman. This was a subversive reveal as it is surprising to see that such a conventionally motherly person could possess such unnatural strength to kill so brutally and quickly, all the while avoiding blood spatter. Mrs. Voorhees is much like a Heroic Mother Warrior in that she possesses extraordinary strength, which is tied to her offspring. However, the loss of her child corrupted this strength and led her to commit mass murder. Although backstory for mother figures in horror films have been discussed as a positive thing, it could easily be argued that the backstory of Mrs. Voorhees outside of the fact that she is the mother of the drowned boy, would detract from the efficacy of the reveal of her as the killer. The audience does not even know the name of the drowned boy until she says it, and this
29 Cunningham, Sean S, director. Friday the 13th. Georgetown Productions, 1980. Lennington 79 Mother, May I (Die)? endows the twist with a more satisfying payoff. This is a rare case when backstory or character development for the mother would prove a detriment to the film. Mrs. Voorhees also serves as an example of what can happen when a mother loses her child. Mr. Voorhees is irrelevant. It is the grief of the mother that creates a monster. The fact that Mrs. Voorhees could love anyone so deeply that their loss could corrupt her so entirely serves to glorify the position of motherhood. It also shows the bond of mother and son to be akin to an atomic bond. Once broken, it releases a power strong enough to obliterate those unfortunate enough to be in its path. There is another possible iteration of the The Corrupting Mother, and that is in the Symbol (Psycho). The Symbol is the inverse of the Heroic Mother Saint. She is either dead either for the entire film, or for most of it.
5.2.1 1922
Karen Horney has a chapter, entitled, Problems of Marriage30 in her book concerning marriage and the problems that can arise from such a social institution. Two people living together for an extended of period of time can lead to resentment. A once beloved partner can become annoying. Horney argues that there are other apspects than fatigue at play (Horney 120). She identifies some of these problems as husbands becoming bitter at the loss of indepence which can result in anxiety on behalf of the wife (Horney 120). No movie encountered throughout the course of this research seemed to embody the concept Horney’s writings on the Problems of Marriage than the film 192231. 1922 is based off a novella by Stephen King. The film opens with a man, Wilfred (Thomas Jane), in a hotel room, writing a confession regarding the murder of his wife in the year 1922. Rats can be heard scratching behind the wall as he writes. The film is mainly a portrayal of the confession he is penning. He explains, “In 1922, a man's pride was a man's land. And so was his son” (1922 2017). He is a corn farmer whose acreage largely belongs to his wife, Arlette (Molly Parker) by way of inheritance from her father. Wilfred’s ambition and purpose in life is confined to this farm and passing it on to future generations of his family. The only problem in his life seems to be his wife; she is not content with the farm life and wishes to sell the land to a large company, Farrington’s, looking to purchase it for a generous sum of money, as the land is advantageously located near the rail line. It is clear from early on that the marriage between the two is not harmonious. She suggests that they sell the land, split the money and get a divorce. Arlette insists that she should naturally take their son, Henry (Dylan Schmidt), rationalizing that a 14 year old
30 Chapter from Feminine Psychology, pp. 119-132 31 Hilditch, Zak, director. 1922. Campfire Productions/ Netflix, 2017. Lennington 80 Mother, May I (Die)? boy belongs with his mother. She wishes to movie to Omaha and start a dress shop. This idea seems abhorrent to Wilfred and his thoughts turn sinister: “As a husband, I thought of going to the law on the matter. And yet something held me back. It was not the fear of neighbor’s chatter or country gossip. No, it was something else. I had come to hate her. That was what held me back” (ibid.). He speaks in the same narration about a duality within men. Within each one is another one who is “conniving”. Henry is in love with the neighbor girl, Shannon Cotterie (Kaitlyn Bernard), and Wilfred decides to use this as a tool in turning Henry against his mother. Wilfred informs Arlette that he intends to fight her wishes while she is hanging clothes out to dry. Infuriated, Arlette brings representatives from Farrington’s to the farm. She commences efforts to sell the land in earnest. One day, as Henry and Wilfred work in the fields, he warns Henry that his mother will take him away from Shannon. Wilfred tells Henry that his very identity is at stake as he will lose himself to the evils of the big city. He plants the seed in Henry’s mind that the only way to continue his idyllic existence on the farm is to get rid of Arlette. They begin plotting her murder. Arlette is portrayed as an unpleasant, abrasive woman. Ultimately, however, she is stuck in a toxic marriage, forced into a lifestyle she doesn’t enjoy. She has an opportunity to leave it, and she intends to take it. There is nothing outwardly horrible about her. She simply doesn’t fit. She performs her duties around the farm in bright colors--contrasting starkly with the more practical dress of her husband and son. The plan to murder Arlette is simple: they get her happy and drunk. Wilfred leads his wife to believe that Henry convinced him to agree to selling the land so the three of them can stay together as a family in Omaha. Arlette is overjoyed. In celebration, she drinks copious amounts of beer as she, Henry and Wilfred sit on the porch. She speaks obscenely about Shannon, offending Henry. Arlette becomes so intoxicated that Wilfred has to carry her upstairs and place her in bed. Wilfred and Henry convene in the kitchen before they kill Arlette. Henry wants to do it with a pillow, but Wilfred insists that a knife will be quicker. They end up slitting her throat, but is is not easy or fast. Both Henry and Wilfred have to hold her down as she struggles and slice her throat multiple times before she finally succumbs to her wounds. They originally covered her head with a pillowcase, but it becomes displaced and Arlette is fully aware of who her killers are. Henry and Wilfred drag her to an unused well by the house. Henry faints leaving Wilfred to dump her. Once the boy awakens, the two begin cleaning up the mess. They work through the night, scrubbing blood out of the hardwood floor.
Lennington 81 Mother, May I (Die)? The well becomes a dumping ground for the evidence. When Wilfred looks at his wife for the first time in the daylight, he sees her limbs jutting at horrific angles. Her jaw unhinges in some facsimile of preparing to speak, but a instead a rat claws its way out of her throat. Throughout the rest of the film, rats become the monstrous offspring of Arlette. She possesses the monstrous womb of which Creed writes. 32 Aware that the disappearance of his wife will not go unnoticed, Wilfred packs a suitcase with some of Alette’s belongings, which he dumps into the well. He and Henry lead a cow to stand on the unstable wood covering of the well, so that they may have an excuse to fill it in. Wilfred creates a scenario in which his wife fled on foot, abandoning her son and husband. When the sheriff comes to call, he is convinced. That summer is a prosperous one on the farm. Henry, however, is undone by sin of murdering his mother. He becomes cold and distant. He ends up impregnating Shannon. Henry wants to marry Shannon, but does not have the money. He is angry with his father and says that they should have just done what Arlette wanted in the first place. Shannon’s parents are infuriated. When Shannon’s father, Harlan Cotterie (Neal McDonough), comes to speak with Wilfred about will be happening given the new circumstances, Wilfred watches him approach with hatred. He hates this man because he has an easy wife. A wife who does what she is bidden without complaint, and never disagrees with her husband. Mrs. Cotterie is the symbol of everything that Arlette wasn’t. Harlan informs Wilfred that Shannon will be sent away until she has the baby. Once the child is born, it will be given up. Harlan knows that Wilfred doesn’t have enough money to pay for half of Shannon’s fees, but he demands seventy-five dollars of it, which is still a large sum of money for Wilfred. Wilfred will have to mortgage his house. Henry runs away from home. He leaves his father a note bidding the man not to look for him, unless he wants Henry to give a full confession. Henry rescues Shannon from the institution and the two go on the run together. They still have no money, so they resort to robbery. Wilfred spends a difficult winter alone. He starts seeing apparitions of his wife and rats begin to plague him in earnest. The bitter cold makes its way into his house. Damage to the ceiling results in snow falling right into his living room. When retrieving the money he got for mortgaging the house, he is bitten on the hand by a rat who had been eating the money. The wound is bad. It does not heal even after he cleans and bandages it. He attempts to go into town to have it looked at, but the snow prevents him from leaving the farm. He retreats back into his home and takes medication meant to treat hysteria. He becomes disoriented and falls down the
32 Refer to chapter 2.4 Lennington 82 Mother, May I (Die)? stairs into the basement. He ends up propped against a wall. Myriad rats begin to descend the stairs accompanied by the walking corpse of his wife. Arlette bends down and puts her face to Wilfred’s ear. She unhinges her jaw and tells him secrets that only the deceased could know. Shannon was shot on a robbery gone wrong. Henry tried to save her but was unsuccessful. He shot himself. The young lovers are dead. Wilfred begs Arlette to just kill him, but she does not. Wilfred ends up losing his hand due the rat bite. When he has to identify his son at the morgue, he discovers that the boy’s face has been eaten by rats. While Shannon’s funeral is packed, Henry’s funeral is only attended by Wilfred and the specter of Arlette, flanked by rats. The tragedy even leads the agreeable Mrs. Cotterie to leave her husband. Wilfred ultimately has to sell the farm and he moves to Omaha, where he still can’t escape the rats. As he finishes writing his confession to the murder of his wife, rats are pouring out of the walls in his hotel room. The rat-eaten bodies of Arlette, Shannon and Henry appear to Wilfred. Henry invites his father to join them.
5.2.1.2 Discussion of 1922
Despite her gruesome murder, the consequences of Arlette’s original plans are fulfilled. Had Arlette lived, the farm would have been sold, Henry would have been with her and Wilfred would have been forced to find work in Omaha. The only thing she really didn’t get in the end was her dress shop. Arlette is a symbol of a spiteful marriage. Before her death, she was a Corrupting Mother in the sense that she corrupted the masculine paradise of her husband and son. She is the unwelcome voice of dissention and discontent, which establishes her as a disrupter of peace from the very beginning. Living or dead, Arlette would have made the farming life that Wilfred held so dear, impossible to maintain. Since Wilfred is the only character who sees Arlette after she dies, it is quite possible that she is just the manifestation of his guilt and therefore has no real agency of her own. Ultimately, the real villain of the film is Wilfred. He committed a horrific act out of selfishness—motivated by what he believed was his right in order to protect his land (which belonged to his wife) and his son (whom his wife also claimed as hers) and ultimately he loses both. He is soundly punished for his sin. Wilfred has damned himself and his son in the act of murder, and it shows the insidiousness of male hate. Wilfred simply hates his wife, there were other options, other ways of handling the situation, but he let his hate take over. This ambitious woman was gruesomely slaughtered for getting in the way of the male dreams in her life. She did not fulfil what was expected of a woman at that time. Even the marriage of the Cotteries that caused Wilfred so much jealousy was brittle. After the tragic death of
Lennington 83 Mother, May I (Die)? Shannon, Mrs. Cotterie leaves her husband’s side. She never existed solely for him and after tragedy made her role uninhabitable, she leaves. Isolation plays a large role in fostering the hate, which Wilfred feels for his wife. Town is only reachable by car, and as seen in the film, winter can make the way into town impossible. The family roles are therefore magnified. Another film, which is heavily influenced by isolation is Kubrick's, The Shining. However the events in that film create a scenario for a Heroic Mother, rather than a Corrupting one.
5.2.2 Carrie
Brian De Palma’s 1976 horror classic, Carrie33 depicts another Corrupting mother. Carrie herself is a representation of what Creed would call a “witch”. Director Kimberly Peirce remade the film in 201334. Both films will be discussed, as the remake was indeed popular— having received an audience score of 5.9 out of 10 based off 122,164 ratings on IMDb35. The original, however still outshines the remake with a score of 7.4 out of 10 based off 146,670 votes, also according to IMDb36. The plot of the original will be outlined in this thesis, however, notable difference found in the 2013 remake will also be discussed. Though Carrie follows Carrie White, a young girl who ultimately kills most of her classmates in a horrible and bloody fashion, it is her mother who acts as a corrupting force. In the opening scene of the 1976 film, Carrie White (Sissy Spacek) is underperforming during a game of volleyball. On the way to the locker room, girls pass her by and say mean things to her. Inside the locker room, young women in all stages of undress frolic around in slow motion. No one seems self-conscious and many of the women talk to each other fully naked. No one is hiding. The camera pans to Carrie, seemingly enjoying herself in the shower. She is alone, but not hiding. She washes her body as calm music plays. No one is bothering her and she appears to be having an intimate moment. The camera focuses on her legs. Suddenly blood pours between her thighs. The music stops and Carrie is horrified. Her hands are covered in blood. She cries for help and ends up smearing menstrual blood on her classmates. The girls start throwing feminine hygiene articles at her. The most important of these girls caught up in the bullying are Sue Snell (Amy Irving) and Chris Hargensen (Nancy Allen). The Gym teacher, Miss Collins
33 Palma, Brian De, director. Carrie. United Artists Corp., 1976. 34 Peirce, Kimberly, director. Carrie. Sony Pictures Entertainment, 2013. 35 “Carrie.” IMDb, IMDb.com, 16 Oct. 2013, www.imdb.com/title/tt1939659/?ref_=fn_al_tt_2. 36 “Carrie.” IMDb, IMDb.com, 16 Nov. 1976, www.imdb.com/title/tt0074285/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1. Lennington 84 Mother, May I (Die)? (Betty Buckley) comes to Carrie’s aid. A light explodes, accompanied by music reminiscent of the shower scene from Psycho. Carrie is taken to the principal’s office. Miss Collins and the principal speak about the incident. This has been Carrie’s first period; everyone is bewildered that Carrie could make it to the age of almost 17 without even knowing what a period is. The principal calls Carrie in and after calling her the wrong name several times, she explodes an ashtray. On her way home, a child on a bike mocks her, which results in the child falling off his bike, again this is accompanied by the music reminiscent of Psycho. The audience is introduced to Margaret White (Piper Laurie) as she rings the doorbell of Sue Snell’s mother. She is there to give Mrs. Snell religious literature. Piper Laurie is almost comedic in her portrayal of the fanatically Christian Margaret White. When Carrie sees her mother approaching returning from her visit to the Snell household, she quickly layers up on clothing, obviously wanting to appear modest. After entering her home Mrs. White receives a call from Carrie’s school, informing her of the day’s events. The first thing she says to her daughter after this call is, “You’re a woman now” (Carrie 1976). Mrs. White starts preaching to her daughter, ignoring her daughter’s cries. She blames the menstruation on her daughter’s moral failings. Insinuating that it was impure thoughts that caused the menarche. A hysterical Carrie is forced into a dark closet. She emerges after dark and thanks her mother who is at a sewing machine. Before going to bed Carrie kisses her mother on the cheek and Mrs. White smiles faintly. This moment of tenderness shows the power of the corrupting mother. Carrie loves her mother, but she fears her. Tommy Ross (William Katt) is introduced in the film by way of his poetry. Carrie sits in the back of the classroom while a teacher reads his work proudly in front of the class. Tommy Ross’s face is pleased and he smiles as he receives praise for his talents. The teacher prompts the class to offer up criticisms, and Carrie remarks upon its beauty.. This causes derisive laughter in the room. The teacher begins to mock Carrie and Tommy Ross’s face grows hard. He mutters, “You suck” (ibid.). He is referring to the teacher. The laughter then turns to the teacher. This is an important moment as it shows that there is at least one of Carrie’s peers who will stand up for her. The next scene is a roll call at a detention for the girls involved in the shower bullying. Miss Collins berates the girls about what they have done. The punishment that she had suggested was for the girls to be denied entry to the prom in addition to a three-day suspension. Instead, the girls will have to complete a week of detention lead by Miss Collins in which she will make them exercise rigorously. The punishment for skipping this detention is the three-day suspension and exclusion from prom. While the other girls are in detention, Carrie is in the library. She is Lennington 85 Mother, May I (Die)? looking up books about miracles, which indicates that she thinks her burgeoning powers are not something to be afraid of, but rather an instance of divine intervention. Chris, a popular girl who seems to be the main bully of Carrie’s ends up leaving the detention early in a fit of rage. She tries to get other girls to leave with her, but they stay behind not wanting to miss prom. Sue Snell even tells her to shut up. She seems to be the most remorseful girl regarding the treatment of Carrie. After the detention, she meets up with her boyfriend, Tommy Ross and asks him if he will take Carrie to the prom. Reluctantly and after some time Tommy agrees to ask. Meanwhile, Chris is infuriated about the loss of her prom. She blames Carrie. As she is in the car with her boyfriend, Billy Nolan (John Travolta), it becomes apparent that she is in an abusive relationship with him, as he hits her when she insults his driving. She, however, manipulates him too using sexuality. During a moment of intimacy, she cries out, “I hate Carrie White!” (Carrie, 1976). Tommy first asks Carrie to the Prom when the two are in the library. Carrie simply runs away and sits on a bench near the gym exit. Miss Collins notices Carrie and joins her, asking her what is wrong. Carrie tells her that she has been asked to the prom by Tommy Ross, but is skeptical because she is aware of the company he keeps. Miss Collins then comforts Carrie and takes her into the bathroom so she can look at herself. Collins tells Carrie that she is a pretty girl and suggests different beauty tips in order for Carrie to show this. Collins later confronts Tommy and Sue thinking that it is another cruel joke. Even she cannot really believe that anyone would do anything nice for Carrie. She tries to convince the couple to give up on the plan, but Sue is insistent. Tommy eventually gets Carrie to agree to accompany him to prom by actually showing up at her house. Carrie, horrified to see him on the doorstep as her mother sits inside finally consents. Chris, Billy and some friends go to a pig farm after dark. Billy slaughters a pig and collects its blood. Chris cheers him on, clearly excited by the violence. Chris has begun scheming about how to ruin prom and word has seemingly already reached that Carrie and Tommy are planning to go together. Carrie and her mother eat dinner in a darkness that is poorly lit by candles. Mrs. White remarks that Carrie has not eaten her desert, and Carrie admits that it gives her pimples. Mrs. White tells her that the pimples are yet another punishment from the Lord. Carrie tells her mother that she has been invited to the prom. She tells her that the other kids think she is weird but she really just wants to fit in and it is time for her to do so. Mrs. White is outraged, proselytizing to her daughter: “After the blood come the boys” (ibid.). She forbids her daughter from going to Lennington 86 Mother, May I (Die)? prom. Carrie stands her ground. As she insists that she is going the soundtrack is once again reminiscent of Psycho. Mrs. White tries to leave the kitchen but Carrie insists that she listen to her. Carrie slams the windows shut which causes Mrs. White to stop and call her daughter a witch. She tells Carrie that her power came from the devil and that the devil took her father away. Carrie tries to reason with her mother, she doesn’t see the power as something threatening. There have been others who had possessed telekinetic powers. Carrie also informs her mother that everyone knows that her father actually just ran away to be with another woman. After the confrontation between Carrie and her mother, the audience sees Billy and Chris setting up a bucket of pig’s blood on a rafter in the gym as part of their plan to ruin Carrie’s prom. Chris is later shown putting her plot into action at the school recruiting different friends to help her. The pig blood is meant for Carrie. Carrie prepares herself for prom. She shops for makeup and makes her own dress all the while Mrs. White is rocking back and forth and praying. On the actual night of Prom, Carrie stands in front of her mother in her dress. Mrs. White finds it sinful and begs her daughter to take the dress off so the two can burn it together. Mrs. White also tells her daughter repeatedly that Tommy will not be coming and the other kids will just laugh. Carrie does her best to ignore this, but has to intervene once her mother starts hurting herself. Carrie uses her powers on her mother, making her sit down, once again the use of her powers is accompanied by the harsh screeching of string instruments. Tommy does indeed arrive and as Carrie departs, Mrs. White says, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” (ibid). Despite being nervous, Carrie has a wonderful time at prom. She is complimented on her dress and Tommy is patient with her anxiety. Miss Collins finds Carrie at her table and talks to Carrie as Tommy goes off to get refreshments. In contrast to Carrie’s mother, Miss Collins is warm. She tells Carrie that she looks beautiful and recalls her own prom night. Carrie is beaming throughout the interaction. This is a significant moment in the film because it is the first truly enjoyable conversation with an adult woman that Carrie has been depicted as having. The other times she spoke with Miss Collins, she was either being terrorized or beset by worry. At the end of the conversation, Miss Collins embraces Carrie. Carrie’s happiness at prom appears overwhelming. She dances with Tommy and even kisses him. Mrs. White is still on her mind and she insists that she still has to be home early. Sue sneaks into the prom to check on Carrie and Tommy. When Carrie and Tommy are elected prom king and queen, Carrie is brought to tears of joy. Meanwhile, Chris and Billy sit under the stage ready to pull the rope connected to the bucket of pig’s blood in the rafters. Since Sue is hiding backstage, she notices that there is something amiss. She sees the rope and the bucket and eventually realizes that Chris and Billy are under the stage. As she tries to reach them to stop Lennington 87 Mother, May I (Die)? them, Miss Collins only sees Sue. Sue is ejected from prom and as the doors slam, the bucket falls. Carrie is immediately drenched. All sound cuts out except for the sound of running water reminiscent of the shower scene where Carrie first encountered her menstrual blood. Her face contorts into a silent scream. Out in the audience one of Chris’s friends is doubled over in laughter. Tommy yells out in anger as the bucket falls on his head. As he collapses the relative silence is broken by Margaret White’s voice telling her daughter, “They’re all going to laugh at you” (Carrie, 1976). This repeats repeatedly accompanied by the chanting from the shower scene.
5.2.2.1 Discussion of Carrie
In the 2013 remake of the film, starring Chloe Grace Moretz as Carrie and Julianne Moore as Margaret White, there are several noteworthy differences. Firstly, the remake was updated to reflect the time in which the film was released. Chris films Carrie’s ordeal on her cell phone. In stark contrast to the 1976 film, there is absolutely no nudity. There is however more graphic violence. In the original film when a blood soaked Carrie has left prom and encounters Billy and Chris driving away, Carrie just flips the car and it explodes. In the 2013 remake, the audience witness Chris’s face as it goes through the car windshield in slow motion. Many of the deaths in the remake are slow and shown with relish, whereas in the original they appear more quick and brutal. The ending of the remake is also an important difference. In the STEVEN KING NOVEL37, Sue Snell is worried because her period is late. After she speaks to a dying Carrie at the end of the novel, her period commences with unusual force. In the 1976 film, there is no indication that Sue Snell might be pregnant. In the 2013 remake, however, Sue Snell makes her way to Carrie’s house. Inside Carrie is cradling her dead mother and her home is crumbling around her. When Sue comes in, Carrie’s abilities somehow enable her to provide Sue with the information that she is pregnant with a girl. Carrie uses telekinesis to send Sue a safe distance away and the house crumples on her and her mother.
5.2.3 Psycho
It would be difficult to discuss mothers in horror films while ignoring Mrs. Bates from Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 classic, Psycho38. This film was also chosen because of its enduring relevance. Mrs. Bates is an exemplary Corrupting Mother. She literally takes over the mind of her son and leads him to commit murder. It is the number one film from IMDb’s list of Highest
37 King, Stephen. Carrie. Doubleday, 1974. 38 Hitchcock, Alfred, director. Psycho. Paramount Pictures/ Universal Pictures, 1960. Lennington 88 Mother, May I (Die)? Rated Horror Feature Films With At Least 25000 Votes. The influence of this film on the horror genre cannot be easily overstated. To begin the analysis, a description of the plot will be necessary. Following this description, a deeper analysis of the significance of the occurrences in the plot will take place. The film opens with Marion Crane spending her lunch break in a hotel room with her lover, Sam Loomis. The pair are not married, which already places Marion on the “whore” side of the virgin/whore dichotomy. Sam is divorced and in debt. They cannot get married now because of these money troubles, but Marion expresses a desire to do things respectably and have him over for boiled steak so he can meet her sister. Later, Marion returns to work. She is entrusted with $40,000, which she is supposed to deposit in the bank. The money is intended to buy the newlywed daughter of a rich man her first house. A contrast exists here between Marion and the young woman for whom the money is intended. The bride’s father is paying for his daughter’s future while Sam pays off the debt of his father. This bride is respectable, whereas Marion is not thanks to her premarital trysts. Instead of depositing the money, Marion absconds with it. She becomes paranoid as she drives away, even being spotted by her boss. She sleeps in her car on the side of the road and is awoken by a police officer. Paranoid, she exchanges her car for another one. She ends up checking into the Bates Motel. The friendly Norman Bates greets her. As she is checking in his hands hesitate over which key to give her—hinting at an internal battle in his mind. As will be established later, the morally correct side of the battle is lost as he decides on giving her the key to the room closest to the office. Marion signs in with a false name. He invites Marion up to the house for dinner. Marion never makes it up to the house, however, as a loud conversation between Norman and his mother firmly establishes that Mrs. Bates will not allow this strange girl into the home. She accuses her son of having dirty thoughts about the woman, and questions Marion’s moral character. Norman Bates’s mother is established as a domineering, moralistic woman who exercises an abnormal amount of control over her adult son. Marion and Norman end up sharing sandwiches in the parlor, which is decorated by taxidermy birds. Norman stutters and tells Marion that she eats like a bird, although this is somewhat of a false colloquialism as birds eat a great deal. Norman stutters as he speaks but gives off the impression of a kind young man who is only shy. The conversation turns to his mother. Norman admits that sometimes he feels trapped. Nevertheless, he stays out of loyalty. He says that it must have been a strain on her for her to raise him all by herself once his father died. He talks of a man who talked his mother into buying the motel. When he died, Norman said it was simply too much for his mother. Later in the film, another version of this sequence of events surrounding this man’s death will be discussed. Norman notes, “A son is a poor Lennington 89 Mother, May I (Die)? substitute for a lover” (Psycho, 1960). Which is an odd thing to say, because within this statement, Bates is implying that the two could even be compared or considered for the same role. He becomes defensive when Marion suggests that he send her to an institution. He loses his stutter when he passionately defends his mother and takes on a sinister tone. Norman says, “We all go a little mad sometimes” (ibid.). Marion agrees. She seems to decide that she will return the money the next day. As she stands to leave Norman seems a little disappointed to see his conversation partner leave. She explains that she has a long drive the next day. As she shakes his hand in farewell, she lets slip her real name. This does not go unnoticed by Norman and he checks the ledger in the office, now realizing that she signed in with a false name. It is possible that in this moment Marion has gone from being a good girl in his perception, to the kind of woman that his mother warns him against. The kind that his mother wishes harm. The hesitation over which key to give Marion becomes clear as she retreats to her room. Norman moves a painting in the parlor and watches as Marion undresses and prepares for a shower. She is wearing black underwear, which hints at a corrupt nature. Marion is stabbed to death in the shower by what appears to be Mrs. Bates. Once dead, she is just left there as the water keeps running. Norman is horrified to see blood on his mother and runs down to check on Marion. Upon discovering she is dead, he is upset but calms himself rather quickly. He cleans the crime scene and disposed of Marion, her belongings—including the money—and her car in a nearby lake. Marion’s disappearance does not go unnoticed. Sam finally meets Marion’s sister, Lila (Vera Miles), although it us not under the circumstances that Marion had originally wished for. Lila confronts Sam at work asking of he knows here Marion is. Lila thinks that Marion took the money to fund a life for the two of them. He denies knowing about anything about it. During this conversation, a private investigator, Detective Milton Arbogast (Martin Balsam), joins them. He is looking for Marion as well. The three team up in the hopes of finding Marion. Arbogast investigates and eventually finds his way to the Bates motel. Norman is on the porch eating candy corn. He is just as friendly with Arbogast as he was with Marion in the beginning. However once Arbogast begins his questioning, becomes incredibly agitated. He tries to lie, but is childishly incompetent. Eventually he admits to Arbogast that he had seen Marion. Norman refuses to let Arbogast speak to his mother. Arbogast calls Lila and Sam informing them that he will join them in an hour and that he is unsatisfied, believing that Mrs. Bates had knowledge crucial to the case. Before leaving Arbogast decides to enter the home, and try to investigate further. He too falls victim to Mrs. Bates.
Lennington 90 Mother, May I (Die)? Once Arbogast has failed to return, Lila becomes increasingly concerned. Sam goes to investigate the motel himself but no one is there upon his arrival. He returns to Lila and the pair decide to go to the sheriff’s house where they speak with him and his wife. It is late at night and the couple are in their nightclothes. The sheriff isn’t particularly helpful and thinks that the PI found Marion and simply left with her and the money. The sheriff reluctantly calls Norman but nothing of use is learned. The most important piece of information received from this interaction with the sheriff is the knowledge that Mrs. Bates has been dead for 10 years in an apparent murder/suicide. It was believed that Mrs. Bates killed the man she was involved with upon learning that he was married. Norman found them dead in bed together. Norman, aware of the mounting suspicion, moves his mother to the cellar of the house, despite her fierce protests. Lila and Sam decide to go to the motel and pose as husband and wife. As Sam distracts Norman, Lila slips away to investigate the house. In what appears to be Mrs. Bates’s room, the outline of a body is imprinted unnaturally deeply into the bed. In what appears to Norman’s room are a lot of toys and a small, unmade twin bed. Sam, meanwhile, is asking Norman a series of leading questions, accusing him of taking the money in order to build a better motel. Norman realizes that Lila is gone. He knocks Sam down and runs to the house. Lila hears Norman come inside the house and sneaks into the cellar where she sees Mrs. Bates from behind. Lila approaches the woman and the chair turns around to reveal the preserved corpse of Mrs. Bates. As she screams Norman, dressed in his mother’s clothing approaches from behind but is overpowered by Sam. At the police station, it is revealed that Norman had killed his mother and this drove him mad to the point where he created her in his mind. A psychiatrist addresses Sam and Lila and tries to clarify Norman’s mental state. He explains that when Norman killed his mother, he incorporated her into his mind. Like I said... the mother... Now to understand it the way I understood it, hearing it from the mother... that is, from the mother half of Norman's mind... you have to go back ten years, to the time when Norman murdered his mother and her lover. Now he was already dangerously disturbed, had been ever since his father died. His mother was a clinging, demanding woman, and for years the two of them lived as if there was no one else in the world. Then she met a man... and it seemed to Norman that she 'threw him over' for this man. Now that pushed him over the line and he killed 'em both. Matricide is probably the most unbearable crime of all... most unbearable to the son who commits it. So he had to erase the crime, at least in his own mind. He stole her corpse. A weighted coffin was buried. He hid the body in the fruit cellar. Even treated it to keep it as well as it would keep. And that still wasn't enough. She was there! But she was a corpse. So he began to think and speak for her, give her half his life, so to speak. Lennington 91 Mother, May I (Die)? At times he could be both personalities, carry on conversations. At other times, the mother half took over completely. Now he was never all Norman, but he was often only mother. And because he was so pathologically jealous of her, he assumed that she was jealous of him. Therefore, if he felt a strong attraction to any other woman, the mother side of him would go wild. The psychiatrist explains that Norman felt an attraction to Marion, which was something the mother side of his brain couldn’t endure. The film ends with a long shot of Norman’s face as his mother’s thoughts in his head are narrated through voice over. The Mrs. Bates part of Norman’s brain blames her son for the murders. She won’t even swat at the fly in the room with her.
5.2.3.1 Discussion Of Psycho
Mrs. Bates is dead for duration of the film. Nothing is known of her, really, except for Norman’s interpretation of her and some comments made here and there by others, such as the psychiatrist calling her clingy. However, there is evidence to support the idea that Mrs. Bates was perhaps always a victim of her son. The fact that Mrs. Bates’s had a lover to whom she was not married implies that Mrs. Bates wasn’t so moralistic as to be opposed to having relations out of wedlock. Perhaps she even knew the whole time that her lover was married. Mrs. Bates falls into the category of corrupting mother, however, it is quite likely that Norman is the one who corrupted her. In this case, it is motherhood as a concept that has become corrupted. Norman wants a controlling mother. Norman wants the mother who will not let him get close to anyone else. Mrs. Bates also fits into the role of a corrupting mother in that her husband is almost completely irrelevant. He died, and it appears that it upset her. But it is possible that it upset her in the way that losing Oskar upset Amelia in The Babadook (see the chapter on The Babadook). The family structure has been upset, all of a sudden the responsibility is thrust onto the shoulders of Mrs. Bates and she is left alone with a demanding child. Mrs. Bates fell victim to this child and was perverted into a murderous monster in a sense by her son. Mother as a concept is bigger than the Mrs. Bates’s actual performance of mother. Norman Bates wanted his mother to be pure, the mother he wanted was the one he created in his head and this idea of mother can’t exist without the societal idea of motherhood.
Lennington 92 Mother, May I (Die)? 6 Conclusion
The goal of this thesis was to examine the representation of women in horror, not as victims but as mothers. There is more to the horror genre than blood, guts and shallow characters. Horror intends to shock its audiences. It forces the gaze toward unpleasant, ugly things. Inherent in the nature of the genre is the ability to be subversive. By forcing audiences to confront things that make them uncomfortable on a shallow level, deeper meanings are conveyed. Despite its ability to defy conventions, the genre often falls prey to the tropes in media, which reinforce certain societal norms. Motherhood is still presented often as the ideal state for a woman. Leta Hollingworth wrote her essay over a century ago and yet her points echo in the portrayal of motherhood in horror films. With mothers like Mrs. Bates, Margaret White, or even Arlette from 1922, the audience is served with a warning with regard to the consequences and power of “bad” parenting. The maternal instinct is alive and well within the genre. Diane from Poltergeist and Kate from Orphan are imbued with a special power which allows them to save their children. Motherhood creates a bond so strong that not even a dimension filled with ghosts, multiple stab wounds, or even bullets can stop these women from walking away with their children. Horror films can also serve as a warning for men against upsetting, disrespecting or ignoring their wives. It leads to the downfall of Kate’s husband in Orphan, the loss of everything Wilfred held dear in 1922 and the obliteration of almost the entire family in Sinister. Often one encounters “turning points” when watching a horror film. One could ask myriad “what if” questions. What if Carrie’s mother hadn’t been fanatical? What if Norman Bates’s father hadn’t died and the family had remained intact so he never would have seen his mother engaged in an affair? What if John had taken Kate seriously in Orphan when she expressed concerns about Esther? Ultimately, these movies would not have been as entertaining, but it is these nagging questions that could lead an audience member to imagine what they would have done in these scenarios. This constructs a reality in which there is a right and a wrong. Had Margaret White been a nurturing mother, Carrie might have fit in at school and may never have even discovered her telekinetic powers. If John had listened to Kate, he would have survived, their son would not have been injured and the family could have walked away from the situation—himself included. These are the way things should have been but weren’t. Sometimes these turning points are things that couldn’t have been helped, as is the case with Mr. Bates. In the case of the Mentally Vulnerable Mother, the portrayal of mental health is important. The depiction of mental health can be shown irresponsibly. The most abhorrent was
Lennington 93 Mother, May I (Die)? to be found in Lights Out. Institutionalization was not a healing part of Sophie’s past, but rather the place where she encountered the dark presence which would haunt her for the rest of her life. It was mentioned in the film that when Sophie took medication, Diana went away. But ultimately, the solution was presented as suicide. In Hereditary, Annie was visibly more affected by the loss of her daughter than her husband and that left her open to the whims of the cult. Her grief as a mother unbalanced her in ways that did not affect her husband although he presumably also loved his child. The research conducted over the course of this thesis was necessarily limited. It by no means provides an overview of the entire, complicated horror genre. However, it seeks to emphasize trends which become visible when one watches a great deal of horror movies. Of the films watched, analyzed or mentioned in this thesis, three were directed by women, Jennifer Kent’s The Babadook, Kimberly Pierce’s remake of Carrie, and Karyn Kusama’s The Invitation. The Chilean Alejandro Amenábar39, the director of The Others was the only openly homosexual director. There was one Black director, Jordan Peele of Get Out and two Asian directors, Wan and Kusama. The onscreen characters were overwhelmingly white, with a few exceptions, such as Get Out and the Invitation. Every family depicted as a central family, however, was white. There were was one openly gay couple (The Invitation). None of the films analyzed depicted a family that one could interpret as living in poverty. Indeed, most of the houses, which featured central families, were quite large. Further, every central family ascribed to heteronormativity. The research conducted for this thesis points to the conclusion that many these horror films are leading audiences to view the white nuclear family living a middle-class life as the ideal. Women are still being recruited into motherhood. Additionally, “good” parenting is what keeps the world from chaos. Many of these films warn against what happens when the nuclear family falls apart. If the film is successful in getting the audience to identify with the characters, then the “what if” or “if only” scenarios, become even more compelling. Moving forward, horror is experiencing what seems to be an increase in popularity. Despite the paucity of non-heteronormative families depicted in mainstream horror films, members of the LGBT community are finding themselves represented in horror television shows. In the recent release of The Haunting of Hill House40, which follows the experiences of the Craine family after having lived in a haunted house, one of the Craine siblings is an out lesbian. Her family
39 Empire. “Alejandro Amenabar.” Empire, Empire, www.empireonline.com/people/alejandro- amenabar/. 40Flanagan, Mike, director. The Haunting of Hill House, Season 1, episode 1-10, Netflix, 12 Oct. 2018. Lennington 94 Mother, May I (Die)? easily accepts her this fact and at the end of the season; she is shown to have married her girlfriend. American Horror Story41 is also a popular horror television show and it has depicted openly gay characters since its first season. The series is told in an anthology like manner with many of the same actors portraying different characters seasons. The diversity of the characters has also improved over the seasons. As discussed heavily in the section of Heroic Mothers, mothers are often given inhuman strength for the sake of their children. However, the 2016 film Hush42, directed by Mike Flanagan depicts a deaf woman displaying almost inhuman levels of strength and wit to outsmart a murderous home intruder. This woman is motivated by nothing but the will to survive. Self- preservation, and not holy, unselfish love provides enough motivation for the heroine to survive. The horror genre has the ability to be subversive due to the nature of its themes. In spite of this subversive ability, the films in this thesis indicate the heteronormative nuclear family is prioritized both as something to protect and something, which women draw their strength from. Horror films are generally cheaper to make than films of other genres and tend to be more consistently profitable.43 While filmmaking of any capacity is a costly endeavor, horror has a comparatively low barrier to entry. This low barrier to entry, combined with the prospect of profits, creates significant opportunities for other voices to be heard that may not have the same opportunities in other media. Representation in the media is notorious for its erasure of non white identities44. There is much work to be done in media as a whole, but the horror genre provides a promising place to start. Horor of course can be found outside the threats that affect only wealthy Caucasian people. A central family plagued by the supernatural or violent intruders is a staple within the genre. However, the understanding of what constitutes a family and what defines family relationships has been changing for decades. While the bond between parent and child is indisputably an important one, it’s not only the cisgender, biological mother who grows and gains from it. This thesis focused on the mother figure as a means of critiquing the implications surrounding motherhood and family espoused by horror films. The mothers were at times, strong, frightening, irrelevant or vulnerable. Some
41 Murphy, Ryan, et al. American Horror Story, Season 1-8, FX, 5 Oct. 2011. 42 Flanagan, Mike, director. Hush. Blumhouse Productions, 2016. 43 Follows, Stephen. The Horror Report; The Most Comprehensive Data Study of the Horror Genre Ever. Stephen Follows Film Data and Education, 2018. 44 Beller, Jonathan. “Pathologistics of Attention.” The Message Is Murder; Substrates of Computational Capital, Pluto Press, 2018, pp. 115–136. Lennington 95 Mother, May I (Die)? were more richly developed than others. They provided insight into how those in power in the horror genre view and present women.
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