Other Mommy

Blumhouse and Atomic Monster aced the marketing game for Other Mommy. Its trailer debuted before The Odyssey, and reportedly played ahead of every screening. Promoting it in front of the highest-grossing R-rated movie of the year gave them even more bang for their buck, ensuring it would get maximum attention. Especially since its trailer pulled off a wonderful little tonal shift, gesturing towards a domestic drama before dialing up the menace and surreality that define the film itself. Sure, some audience members complained about being scared before a historical epic, despite an R rating warning them to be prepared for mature content (which the later spate of parents bringing kids to an unsettling indie horror flick proves few heed). But if the minor controversy had any impact at all, it was to further boost knowledge of and interest in it. It's a clear win, as demonstrated by its opening weekend gross.

We experience the story from the perspective of Bela (Arabella Olivia Clark), a seven-year-old girl about to start at a new school. As such, there's never any doubt of the existence of the creature in her closet, which she dubs "Other Mommy" on account of it taking the form of her mother (Jessica Chastain). But their interactions always turn towards the disturbing, no matter how mundane they begin. Either Other Mommy will change its form or it will become aggressive or ask to go into Bela's heart, with the apparent intent of gaining a permanent corporeal form. We never learn much about what it is or how it came to haunt Bela. but there appears to be a connection with her parents' marital strife on account of her mom's ongoing infidelity, which Bela keyed into before her dad (Jay Duplass).

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