Review of I Am Mother (2019) by Metempsychosis — 08 Jun 2019

Great scifi movie that manages tense moments, intermixed with a good mystery and heartwarming moments.

Curiously, we have a practical effects robot that is a better character than several mainstream actors in certain high-budget movies. That is because the machine is superbly animated with great practical effects mixed with CGI and voiced by a great VA. GLaDOS would better watch out if this was a series.

Both actresses were superbly cast and acted superbly, which was augmented by an excellent soundtrack and atmosphere, both within the facility and outside.

The story follows the expected point of the genre, but manages to subvert them creatively while I felt the movie played satisfactorily with my expectations.

If one small thing could be added, is that I thought that Mother's internal motivations and wishes could afford to be explored deeper. As evidenced by the machine wanting to touch the baby one last time by the end, it did have a form of what we call feelings. I would've liked to see, in some way, in what way did the second child fail and how did Mother express that to the child, as the movie has indicated that Mother saw Daughter's performance as a form o evaluation of her own ability to teach and rear a child.

In conclusion, it's the kind of movie that makes me happy I have a Netflix subscription.

One final thing: I don't entirely understand what was Mother's plan with Daughter going out of the bunker with Woman or even what was Daughter supposed to learn from that. Most importantly, I'm not sure why Mother determined that Daughter was ready or why she couldn't keep helping. That part of the conflict felt contrived. The whole ending seemed a bit rushed or nonsensical to me.