Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: mother! (2017)

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Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 09-17-2017, 12:07 AM:

CINEMA: Regal Warren East, Wichita, KS
AUDITORIUM: 10
PRESENTATION: Warren 21 Recline-O-Vision Regal Roller Coaster Vision
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: None [Cool]

RATING: Zero stars (out of four)

THE PLOT: A house burns down. Wackiness ensues

WHAT. the ACTUAL. FUCK.

Posted by Mark Ogden (Member # 43) on 09-18-2017, 03:54 PM:

Chaos and violence ensues when a blocked writer and his beautiful young wife allow two apparent strangers into their home. At the AMC Riverside Cinemas, Hackensack, New Jersey.

*****

This picture certainly hits all of the Old Testament checklist: a self-described “creator” (referred to in the credits as “Him”) with a virginal young wife allows an adoring Adam into their house, which sits in a large, lush Eden-like field with no driveway and nothing else around it, a house that the young wife is rebuilding after a terrible fire. He is followed in due course by a conniving Eve and their Cain and Abel surrogate sons, and by a hoard of others who eventually trash the place, all the while speaking of love and caring. There’s also an apparently sexless pregnancy, hundreds more worshippers, carnage, mayhem and almost indescribable violence, all leading up to, well, you can probably imagine (“I have to go clean up after the Apocalypse”, Jennifer Lawrence’s character says at one point, without knowing what has yet to come).

This film was recently in the entertainment news for earning a rare CinemaScore of “F”, and I can guess that it came from either people who went into it expecting a conventional horror film and wound up totally clueless, or, alternately, folks who picked up on its deeply anti-religion theme and its depiction of “Him” as a malign narcissist who lives for the adoration of his selfish and violent followers, and who will allow death and depravity to get it. Being anti-religion myself, I enjoyed the hell out of it, really a fascinating and infuriating picture.

I might also add that I hope director Darren Aronofsky treats his girlfriend Jennifer Lawrence nicely, she certainly put out for him in this and I don’t mean sexually. After dragging herself literally through Hell, she ends the picture taking a beating so vicious that I looked away. I hope he bought her something nice afterward.

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 09-19-2017, 10:49 PM:

wow ~ just wow! what an utterly bonkers movie - I was blown away by it. The highlight though being the outlandish evocative 7.l sound design. I'm glad I really ignored all the trailers, reviews and such and went into this blindly.

Posted by Harold Hallikainen (Member # 5405) on 09-19-2017, 11:46 PM:

It WAS very strange! Sort a combination of Pacific Heights and Fall of the House of Usher.

Harold

Posted by Marcel Birgelen (Member # 6801) on 09-25-2017, 05:07 AM:

Brought to you by the same guy who brought us his Atheist vision of Noah's Ark. Then again, the same guy did make some respectable features in the past...

Well, I really liked the sound mix, it was, indeed evocative. It used the surrounds for good purpose. For example, if somebody walked around the room, his dialogue went with him or her.

I also liked most of the cinematography.

Unfortunately, a movie is not judged by those things alone. Were it was lacking was most definitively in the story department.

Yes, I get it. It's a piece of art, crammed full of allegories. Unfortunately, it's also a 2 hour long piece of moving images and sound. Do something with that, try to tell a compelling, coherent story with some depth to it, for example. People might actually start to like you for it.