Remember a couple of movies ago, I said I owed Ms. Spenser a horror movie TBA? I paid that debt with The Babadook (2014). I had been adamant about not watching this - parent/child violence is usually too far for me to go. But, hey, I got to see Charlie's Angels (2019).
It stars Essie Davis (Miss Fisher from one of our favorite detective series) as a single mom in Australia. The movie starts with a horrible car crash in slow motion, which turns out to be a dream - or a memory. She is pretty frazzled at the start of the movie. Her young son, Noah Wiseman, is frightened of monsters under the bed, and also builds fairly violent weapons to fight them - a backpack cricket ball catapult, for example. It turns out that car crash killed her husband when he was driving her to the hospital to deliver Wiseman.
They seem to be doing pretty OK anyway. Her mother-in-law lives next door and can help out, and her sister has a girl about Wiseman's age. Then one night, Wiseman asks Davis to read a book that just appeared on the shelf - "Mr. Babadook". Mr. Babadook is a creepy monster who gets kids if you let him in. Wiseman spends the rest of the night screaming in horror.
As time goes on, he continues to freak out. He can't sleep, and makes sure that she can't either. She destroys the book, but it shows up again. It gets bad enough that she takes him to the hospital, but they find nothing wrong - maybe he can see a psychiatrist in a few weeks. That won't be soon enough to save Davis' sanity.
She starts cracking up, seeing things, having violent visions. If she lets her guard down, the Babadook will possess her, and she will start killing.
One the whole, this wasn't as scarring as I was afraid it would be. Not as bad as Hereditary, for instance. OK - SPOILER - the dog dies. But it was kind of annoying. Also, it was a very well-made movie, lovely to look at, full of fine acting, and very true to life. I wish it had been less true.
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