The work of a true visionary.
Before I begin to delve into the nuts and bolts which make mother! tick (and trust me, there are more than just a few), I just wanted to remind people that the Jennifer Lawrence-starring film is a Paramount Pictures release. Yes, this unclassifiable horror/thriller which comes loaded with one major allegory after another, came from one of the biggest studios in the world. In the franchise-happy age of today, let the fact that a top player in the movie world said yes to such a revolutionary piece, sink in. Let us bask in that mere fact, appreciate it and never forget it.
Written and directed by Darren Aronofsky, mother! centers on a young woman identified merely as Mother (Lawrence), who is busy reconstructing the large, sprawling country estate her much older husband, known as HIM (Javier Bardem), called home before it was ravaged in a fire. The young wife’s main goal is to make a paradise for the two of them. However there’s trouble in the form of an unending case of writer’s block HIM, a once celebrated poet, is suffering from. If that weren’t enough, the appearance late one night of a stranger known as Man (Ed Harris) unnerves Mother. The feeling is clearly not shared by HIM, who becomes so taken with this unexpected visitor, that he invites him to stay. When Man’s wife, Woman (Michelle Pfeiffer) arrives the following morning, it signals the beginning of one hellish event after another with Mother at the center of it.
The architecture of mother! has been divided into two halves. The first is a mix between Edward Albee and Noel Coward where Mother tries to adjust to the intrusion caused by Man and Woman and the way HIM has taken to the two of them. The film has chamber drama-like qualities as it follows Mother while she observes the older couple exhibiting the kind of passion which is undeniably lacking in her own marriage, despite doing everything in her power to keep the spark alive. It’s here that mother! starts to paint itself as film about the fear of love; having love, but never being able to fully enjoy it due to a worry that it will eventually be taken away. Just as such notions begin to take shape however, Man and Woman’s sons (Domnhall and Brian Gleeson) turn up and a macabre form of dark comedy ensues as a family saga is played out right in front of a bewildered Mother, who is literally marveling at how quickly things have gotten out of control in her own home. Ultimately, all of this makes the first half of mother! comes off as a fever dream, existing in a slightly heightened reality that is simultaneously rational and complex.
If the first half of the film is a fever dream, then the second is just a flat out nightmare. From the moment Mother announces she is expecting, mother! begins a rapidly escalating descent into hell. With touches and flourishes which would have made Luis Bunel and pioneers of the Dada movement positively gleeful, mother! takes its audience on an electrifying trip that is the very definition of surreal. The audience is dragged along for the ride with Mother as she watches horror after horror play out right before her very eyes in the place she once called home. It’s here where Aronofsky creates a kaleidoscopic view of themes including celebrity obsession, police brutality, the act of unending consumption and the idea that privacy is nothing but a fantasy, among many, many others. While there is much to comment on all of the film’s motifs, what it amounts to it that no paradise, however remotely secluded or lovingly constructed, can shield one from the outside world. Regardless if a person decides to simply ignore it, or go so far as to virtually sequester themselves in a country home, in this day and age, it is simply impossible to escape the horrors of the outside and the society we ourselves have created.
It’s incredibly hard to judge the performances of mother! since Aronofsky has not created written characters so much as symbols and ideas and then cast well-accomplished actors as their human counterparts.
As the film’s star, Lawrence is present in every scene and therefore the film’s emotional core. Yet so much of her part is reactionary, leaving the actress to more or less observe the other people in the room, while emoting her own feelings through looks and gestures. What the part does allow her to do is play vulnerability in the way the actress has never been called on to do before. Seeing both her love and the paradise she helped come to life be taken away brings forth level after level of vulnerability until she is finally able to find her voice. It’s a work which brings with it one of the most emotionally stripped down and naturalistic performances of Lawrence’s career which will not soon be forgotten.
Likewise Bardem unleashes the various sides to his part; slightly more fleshed out than Lawrence’s. As the film’s artist, the actor shows the many different sides to the creative ego. Him is seen to be selfish, egotistical, excitable, irritable, passionate, tortured and maniacal. The part requires an extremely fine line where HIM must never be loathed, but cannot fully be liked either, making what might seem like a straightforward role in reality, anything but. Much like his leading lady, the actor bravely succeeds (especially in one extended scene which has him holding one long, continuous piercing stare) in what will be one of the most memorable turns in his career.
Of all the supporting players in mother!, only Pfeiffer manages to make a real impression as a vodka-lemonade gulping presence who delights in how uncomfortable she makes Mother feel through an endless series of boundary-crossing questions. It’s a bold departure for Pfeiffer, not so much in terms of what she’s asked to do on screen, but rather in taking the kind of woman most people would want to avoid in real life (curious, mischevious, bitter and hostile) and turning her the film’s most dynamic and intriguing figure. Pfeiffer nails and steals every scene she’s in so effectively, that the way the camera follows her as she makes her exit is nothing short of breathtaking; as if it knows what the film will lose once she’s gone.
Following mother!’s initial premieres at both Venice and Toronto there have been a myriad of different reactions and theories that have resulted; a fact Aronofsky must’ve braced himself for long ago. While some have called the film a feminist statement, others have proclaimed it an indictment on the treatment of the environment. Even aspects from the director’s own works all feature in here in one way or another. Black Swan’s shaky grip on reality, Noah’s religious re-telling, Requiem for a Dream’s take on obsessive madness, The Fountain’s undying devotion to love and The Wrestler’s illustration of physical sacrifice all turn up in mother!.
As a cinephile, one of my recurring thoughts regarding film is the fear that we will eventually run out of stories to tell; that every conceiveable plot will eventually be shot and shown for every person to decipher. mother! gives me hope and fills me with assurance that this is never going to happen since we as a society, as a species, are full of stories, which are open to endless interpretation and forever worthy of cinematic exploration.
