Mothers of Monsters Review: Tense and Sadistically Orchestrated

A tense and sadistically orchestrated horror movie that leaves its mark far after the credits roll. Check out our Mothers of Monsters review.

A distraught mother (Hamilton) suspects her teenage son (Edwards) is plotting a school shooting.

After installing an elaborate spy camera system in their home, Abbey captures a series of disturbing videos that confirm her worst fears.

Torn between a mother’s unconditional love and a mother’s acute intuition, Abbey caters her videos to all the other “mothers of monsters” online.

Abbey’s plan backfires when Jacob uses a dark family secret against her, launching both mother and son on a terrifying, and ultimately deadly, game of cat and mouse.

Mothers of Monsters is a very tense, gripping and beautifully structured found footage movie.

We dot around between home-camera spy footage and handheld footage. 

We see the perspective of Abbey’s (Hamilton) computer as she has stored footage of her son from his baby years up to private footage she has copied off his computer.

Growing ever suspicious of her son and what she fears he’s going to do next is palpable to watch.

The second the film begins we know where we are. We know the situation and we’re thrown into the deep end of this gripping slowly unraveling plot.

Every interaction with mother and son has an unnerving vibe to it. This ‘making of a serial killer’ type vibe that grows stronger with every scene shown.

A slow unraveling of an unstable young man told through found-footage.

Not exactly the best film to be showing people in America currently with school shootings becoming all the more frequent.

But it’s a film that holds much relevance.

Spotting the signs early, acting early and completing the checks needed to prevent attacks happening is a strong undertone of the documentary.

Unfortunately, the core message is overshadowed by focusing too much on this man who you know is plotting to do something bad.

https://www.mothersofmonsters.com

It almost tries to raise awareness about preventing these things happening whilst at the same time confirming nothing can be done and that the inevitable will happen. 

It’s a torn message rather than a direct one.

The film also tries to highlight the common signs of a killer in oh so stereotypical ways. 

Dissected animals, unusual drawings, a warped mind, strange comments, and behavior.

Generic signs granted but if it raises awareness then I’m all for it. 

Sadly, if it was that obvious then these people would be found out much sooner.

What I did enjoy was that throughout the film footage of Jacob (Bailey Edwards) as a young boy was shown. 

This is actual home-video footage of Bailey Edwards as a child which adds to the creep factor. 

The filmmakers have taken innocent footage and twisted it to make him look psychopathic. I loved that touch!

Overall

The movie really picks up speed when Jacob finds out that his mother has been spying on him. That’s when all hell breaks loose.

The film ramps up the tension and the games begin.

Toying with his mother with sick sadistic focus. This movie goes from a creepy slow-burn to heart-thumpingly tense as the finale approaches.

The use of found footage through various camera equipment was a nice touch and this one is well worth a watch!