The Babadook

Truth be told there are a lot of positive things to say about Australian writer/director Jennifer Kent's unsettling horror film "The Babadook." It has an interesting psychological theme that is threaded throughout, and it's made pretty well. The moments when the Babadook is onscreen are terrifying for sure, and the performance by Essie Davis is a tour de force.

So whats not to like?

The story is a fairly simple one. Amelia (Essie Davis) is a single mother whose loving husband died in a car accident the night her son was born. Cut to seven years later: She is frazzled, resents her son (although she tries not to show it), and can't seem to break out of her cycle of depression. Her son Robbie (Daniel Henshall) is obsessed with protecting his mother from unseen monsters, and when he pulls a mysterious book off his book shelf, real monsters start to appear in the form of "The Babadook." The creepy picture book seems to have come out of nowhere, and despite it being horrific and violent, mom gets almost through the entire thing before poor Robbie breaks down. She rips the thing apart and throws it away, but a few days later it reappears, pieced together by an unseen force with new pictures and scrawled rhymes. Soon enough, the "real" Babadook starts to enter their world, and becomes a terrorizing force in their lives... just not in exactly the way you might expect.

This all sounds like loads of horror-movie fun, but that's the problem: It's just not. The characters are sad, and the Babadook is rarely onscreen. As the mother gets more and more affected by the monster, she gets meaner and meaner to her son both mentally and physically. It's just not a pleasant film to watch.

Add to that the set design, which puts their entire house in shades of gray. (Probably fifty or more!) Which, to be fair, seems a bit of a hammer to the head. We get it. You are one miserable family, but who the hell would decorate every square inch of your creepy house like that? (Even the couches and chairs match the drapes and walls.)

One of the best things is the design of the Babadook, which is kept in the dark most of the time and has such a creepy voice/sound that he is truly unnerving. But it's not a fun horror film like "Nightmare on Elm Street" or "Jeeper's Creepers," or even "The Conjuring." This is psychologically dark and brooding stuff. Not one character is happy. Not one character cracks a joke. It is just foreboding, gloomy, and darkly disturbing.

There will be some people that argue that is exactly what is missing from horror films these days; I agree. When the film ends you can dissect the real meaning of what is going on, and for some people there might be a little bit of healing there. We all have demons we need to keep at bay. But the darkness and mean-spiritedness of the characters and their mental states are so tragic and unpleasant that it becomes physically upsetting to watch.