The Official Website of Don McGregor (Copyright 2014 by Don McGregor)
The Babadook inhabits Blu-ray and haunts the Scream Factory Scream Factory domain.
The story-book creature read to children is the iconic centerpiece of the film from Director Jennifer Kent.
The special packaging edition from Shout! has a facsimile of the book a single mother, Amelia Vannick (Essie Davis) reads to her 6-year son Samuel (Noah Wiseman) which opens up from its Dragonflame plush-red covers to a pop-up figure of the shadowy monster, Babadook.
As might be expected in a horror genre film, the young boy begins to fear the Babadook thrives in his room, waiting, waiting, waiting to destroy his family. Noah Wiseman displays a quirkiness that makes his character unique, awkward, sometimes withdrawn, sometimes filled with anger.
Amelia lost her husband during the time period that he was driving her to have Noah, and the bed-time readings are a shared form of intimacy that she allows herself; she is virtually incapable of physical displays of affection with the young boy who continually wants to defend his mother against the Babadook.
The book is well designed visually for the film by illustrator Alex Juhasz, and one of the Extras on the Blu-ray has a section devoted to Juhasz’s crafting of the creature and the total look of the book.
As Samuel becomes more convinced the Babadook resides in the home, the widowed, weary single-mother search the usual haunts for mythic monsters. Under the bed.
Reassurances from the adult that the monster does not exist.
There are monsters that scare kids.
There are monsters that haunt adults.
One should not think that The Babadook is a thrill-ride horror film, even though such familiar sequences from the genre occur during the beginning.
Jennifer Kent has said that this is a film about the trials of a single-mother and the demands that are made daily on her, and the denials she imposes on herself. The film is that. But I see it as more than just about parents and children, though they are the principles that endure what terrifies any thinking adult.
This is about Depression.
This is not about having the Blues.
This is about a portrait of despair. The lighting and texture of the filming continually defines that. The disturbing music and imagery re-enforce that sustained atmosphere.
Having seen too much of the effects Depression can have on people I love, how devastating it can be on a daily basis, for the individual suffering the debilitating disease that many people don’t understand, and believe it can be cured “if people just pull themselves up by their bootstraps.” Whatever the fuck that means.
Would the same people say the same things or harbor the same thoughts for someone who has had a heart attack or a stroke or Cancer?
Only the most callous of individuals would, those without any compassion for other human beings than themselves.
Essie Davis has a demanding role to play as the mother who is a care-taker not only to a son who is difficult to handle to the outside world and to her, but also as a nurse in an Nursing home for the elderly and invalids.
Essie’s performance captures the sense of lethargy in some stages of Depression. Weariness is etched into her face and especially her eyes. Her eyes often look glazed, half-focused as she goes through her daily routine.
The real monster, the real fear, the real threat is that the Babadook can reside inside all of us.
In our heads.
Gradually possess our thoughts.
Take over and make us something we never thought we could be.
And that is the disturbing essence of Kent’s film, that we are all susceptible; we can all meet that fate.
Only the most unaware individual can never have has a taste, an imagining, a furtive knowledge that anything to can happen to us in the future.
None of us are immune.
Wisely, the script slowly showcases the transformation, the slight disintegration of spirit, the isolation from friends before moving from the monsters that frighten the child and the monsters that can devour an adult.
Young Noah Wiseman has a role that could be traumatic for a child, though care was taken to shield him from much of the abuse that occurs as The Babadook goes into its final reels.
There is a true tension and terror in that atmospheric climax.
There is a transition moment that is tricky, especially since Jennifer Kent as a writer and as a director has tried to eschew many horror formulaic approaches after embracing them in the first reels of her film.
There is a true sense though of her wanting to make a film that would disturb, would make people think, would make people care for mother and son.
In the final analysis, Jennifer conquers over The Babadook with a film that has power and dignity of personal perseverance to get it made.
And shine a light on demons that could possess any one of us.
And not even signal us they were coming with three knocks on the wall.
Copyright 2015 by Don McGregor
For those of you wondering about the DRAGONFLAME PLUSH RED cover reference, it’s from one of the prose books I did for Dave Kraft at Fictioneer Books. It can still be found here:
http://www.amazon.com/Dragonflame-Other-Bedtime-Nightmares-McGregor/dp/0934882029
You can find copies of the IDW hardcover DETECTIVES INC right here: http://www.amazon.com/Detectives-Inc-Don-McGregor/dp/1600104940/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1425521468&sr=1-1&keywords=don+mcgregor+Detectives+Inc
This column and many other features are up on
donmcgregor.com
Gary and Dawn Guzzo at Atomic Studios provide all the glitz, glamour, and knowhow.
As might be expected in a horror genre film, the young boy begins to fear the Babadook thrives in his room, waiting, waiting, waiting to destroy his family. Noah Wiseman displays a quirkiness that makes his character unique, awkward, sometimes withdrawn, sometimes filled with anger.
