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Goodnight Mommy
Horror, Thriller
Fact: Identical twin children in movies are creepy. (In real life, too, if we’re being honest, but never mind.) This quietly alarming thriller from Austria puts this truism to good use immediately, starting with scenes of young Elias and Lukas (played by Elias and Lukas Schwarz) running through cornfields (!) and whispering secrets to each other. They live in an isolated country home with their mother (Susanne Wuest), who has just returned from the hospital with her face in bandages. The boys think she’s ... different. She plays favorites with them now, and seems to hold a grudge against one of them. They become convinced that she’s an imposter. The unsettling lengths to which imaginative, traumatized boys will go to solve a mystery is the crux of the film. By plopping us into the story without exposition (Mom might have had cosmetic surgery, but there’s also mention of an “accident”), writer-directors Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala keep us from being sure who’s sane or crazy, good or evil—until the end, when it all becomes heartbreakingly clear.
Official Site: radiustwc.com
Director: Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala
Producer: Ulrich Seidl
Cast: Susanne Wuest, Elias Schwarz, Lukas Schwarz, Hans Escher, Elfriede Schatz, Karl Purker, Georg Deliovsky, Christian Steindl, Christian Schatz and Erwin Schmalzbauer
Director: Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala
Producer: Ulrich Seidl
Cast: Susanne Wuest, Elias Schwarz, Lukas Schwarz, Hans Escher, Elfriede Schatz, Karl Purker, Georg Deliovsky, Christian Steindl, Christian Schatz and Erwin Schmalzbauer
