TEXT: Polina Ryzhova At the rental of a new film by Darren Aronofsky "Mom! ", A provocative and witty horror with Jennifer Lawrence and Javier Bardem. Through numerous cliches from horror films (paranormal house, mysterious strangers, sectarian signs) Aronofsky tells the story of really chilling things - marriage, motherhood and love.
She is a caring hostess, a faithful wife and a craftsman who has restored her husband's house after a fire. He is a poet in a protracted creative crisis, neglecting the way of life. An elderly coughing man (Ed Harris) who allegedly took a couple's house for a hotel, promptly joins a bitchy wife (Michelle Pfeiffer). The hero of Bardem opens the doors of the house to numerous strangers and, finally, finds inspiration. The heroine Lawrence wanders around the house in great anxiety, discovers mysterious rooms, suffers from panic attacks, suspects something amiss and tries unsuccessfully to keep things under control. Constant viscous twilight, the camera menacingly and somewhat woozed around the heroes, the sound is twisted to the maximum - in "Mom! "All rustles, clicks, rattles, crackling can be heard, so that even the sound of boiling water in the kettle grows into a protracted screamer. Aronofsky knows how to create a sensation of an impending catastrophe, and within his horror, his proprietary methods look very organic; at some point it even seems strange that "Mom! "In his filmography - the first horror film. So, a house with paranormal phenomena becomes dangerous not when the heroes are alone, but, on the contrary, when many visitors arrive. Very suspicious strangers are deprived of even an unskilled system of motivations, and in general of any system. Hints of a sect left here and there, on closer examination, turn into a ridiculous parody of the relationship of talents and their fans. Uncertainty and growing chaos lead to frenzy, not only the main character - in a similar situation, the viewer himself. Aronofsky playfully recreates several stereotyped horror films for strings, then several times to change the rules of the game, confuse the viewer, leaving him at the disposal of only a sense of anxiety and the fact that everything is rolling steadily into the tartaras. Uncertainty and growing chaos bring to frenzy, not only the main character - in a similar situation, the spectator himself appears in "Mom! "Of course, there are a lot of biblical references, but it hardly makes sense to build a plot out of them, Aronofsky has virtually no film without citing religious texts -" Pi "," Fountain "," The Wrestler ", after all," Noah ". But this time, the prosaic story of an old-fashioned marriage comes to the fore in which the husband is a "great creator" turning himself inside out, and the wife is "the keeper of the hearth" (literally), the source of care and inspiration. He sits for hours on a blank sheet of paper, theatrically walks around the room, sighing heavily, and looks for any praise and attention. Bardem's character is certainly ominous (Bardem, no doubt, like roles with double and triple bottoms) and at the same time very caricature - in Aronofsky's films it's hard not to notice self-irony. The wife respectfully refers to the occupation of her husband, solves all domestic problems for him, intensively blows the family nest, but at heart he doubts his feelings. Because the husband, in words gentle and courteous, time after time destroys her plans, writing off selfish and extravagant deeds for the needs of creativity. He is not always around, though in the most critical situations he invariably saves her life, which does not cancel the gradually coming understanding - it is because of him that her life is slow, and then it goes faster and faster into hell. You can not stop the happening, you can only ask your husband to do it. But he is not in a hurry - after all, life is his "Mom! "After deducting all the hoaxes and phantasmagorias all the way, it seems to be a classic story about a loving wife and an ungrateful husband. All she wants is to stay alone with her beloved, but this is impossible, because "poetry is a common home". He thoughtlessly opens all the doors wide, she, for security reasons, closes the castle. But he only calls for forgiveness, and she forgives. He just screams that he suffocates in this house, but several times a day from panic it is she who suffocates. However, in no Aronofsky film evil is not outside: in fact, in all his works, the director tells the same story about self-destruction and obsession. In "Pi" the life of the protagonist is destroyed by the idea, in "Requiem for a Dream" - drugs, in "Fountain" - the fear of death, in "The Wrestler" - vocation, in "Black Swan" - the pursuit of perfection, in "Noah" - fanaticism. And the heroine Lawrence in "Mom! ", With the eyes that we observe the triumph of chaos, is also obsessed, in her case it is an obsession with a house, a nest, its victim. It seems to her that the house is bleeding, as well as the heroine Portman in the "Black Swan" it seems that she rips out of her skin black feathers. It seems to her that the house is full of vandals, as well as mathematics to Max Cohen from the "Pi" it seems that in pursuit of the number of God he is persecuted by Kabbalists. In fact, the heroine Lawrence is gradually going crazy - probably, just such a phantasmagoric hell, where events and people are piled into a pile, and looks for someone else's life, lived as their own. She lives the life of her husband, and therefore she does not have the opportunity to choose: it's impossible to stop the happening, you can only ask your husband to do it. But he is not in a hurry - after all, life is his. The more the victim, the stronger the paranoia that the victim was not appreciated, and the stronger the temptation to give an even greater sacrifice - his home, the child, himself. In the absence of a choice, the heroine has to sacrifice, and it is the victims who magnify her role in marriage - reproach the husband is that she moved to this wilderness for his sake and restored the house from the ruins so that he could finish the poem, she throws everything once, but the reproach in her eyes we see a good half of the film. She wants him to feel obligated to her, but he does not feel for some reason - he is too busy with himself. The more the victim, the stronger the paranoia about the fact that the victim was not appreciated, and the stronger the temptation to give an even greater sacrifice - his home, his child, himself. The film Aronofsky very carefully, through numerous metaphors and digressions, peers into the abyss, called "female patience", a sacrifice that allows (again, literally) to give his heart for the sake of love. The toxic image of all the sacrificing woman, the muse in the world culture is almost sacral - it is believed that the victim elevates, relieves of selfishness, is a sign of real feelings, but in the interpretation of Aronofsky this sacrifice is nothing constructive.
On the contrary, it is the result of the desire for self-destruction, the proliferation of an internal wormhole, leading all the main characters of his films to one final. The heroine of the "Black Swan" destroys itself in order to achieve perfection. The heroine of "Mom! "Does the same to feel important. And in this context, the husband's demand to "give everything away" does not look more despotic than the wife's demand to "take everything". Photos: Protozoa Pictures Original article: "Mom! »: Why look Horror Aronofsky.
on female sacrifice.