Watch The Babadook Full Movie
The characters inhabit a world that seems drained of color, with everything from clothes to walls to furniture painted in shades of gray and black, as if they, too, were in a perpetual state of mourning. That creates just the right feel of subjective reality for a movie about monsters that spring not from some far-flung demonic realm but rather from the darkness of our own subconscious. Indeed, Mr. Babadook’s closest predecessor in the canon of bigscreen bogeymen may be the murderous, “psychoplasmic” offspring of the mentally disturbed mother in Cronenberg’s “The Brood.” (Unsurprisingly, when the “monster” makes his first full-bodied appearance, it’s as a terrific piece of stop-motion animation.)
It may be impossible to make a horror movie nowadays without having at least one character, at some point, vomit up the tar-like goo that has become the standard signifier of demonic possession, but even when “The Babadook” traffics in the familiar, Kent manages to put her own signature spin on things. Like Bruno Bettelheim and Angela Carter before her, she’s fascinated by the primal pull of the fantastic, and why the classic fairy tales loom so large in our collective unconscious. But she also has a Melies-like sense of showmanship, and for all its theoretical leanings, “The Babadook” rivals the recent work of James Wan (“The Conjuring,” “Insidious”) in its ability to goose an audience with old-fashioned sound effects, shadow play and the power of suggestion.
Through it all, Kent never compromises the emotional reality of her characters or exploits their suffering for cheap shock effects. Davis, a sturdy supporting player in many Oz films and TV series best known internationally for her work in the two “Matrix” sequels, is a revelation here as the emotionally fragile widow and mother whose grief gradually decays into something more sinister and Jack Torrance-esque. In what is almost exclusively a two-hander, she’s very well matched by Wiseman, a freakishly intense child actor making a very impressive debut. Their ultimate showdown with their unwelcome visitor is harrowing and strangely moving in equal measure, as it suggests that all of us who have loved and lost may have a Babadook of our own lurking somewhere deep within.
In addition to the standout work of production designer Alex Holmes, the pic sports an ace tech package that more than belies its modest budget (reportedly $2.3 million), including Polish d.p. Radek Ladczuk’s sleek, shadowy widescreen lensing.
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