This film was very interesting however it left me with a lot more questions than answers which you never want when you watch something like this. It was very much a psychological horror in that it wasn’t too scary to watch but the implications were horrible.

You Are Not My Mother follows a teenage girl called Charlotte who lives with her mum, her uncle and her gran in a typical house in Dublin. Charlotte is bullied a lot at school and things only get worse at home when her own mother starts having psychotic moments, at no point does Charlotte know whether her mum is going to be in a good mood or bad mood, and then we realise this is because her mum isn’t in fact her mum but someone posing as her to take Charlotte away.

This is where the questions start because at the start of the film we see Charlotte’s gran attempt to set her on fire to release the demon that is inside of her, and then we see Charlotte do the exact same thing to her mother at the end of the film. However we never understand why this monster came into this family, why it attacked them and what it was trying to get out of doing this apart from taking Charlotte away, but we don’t know where they were taking her to. In some ways you can compare it to mental illness and postpartum depression in that they try to harm this child because they think it’s a demon when really the only demon is within the people themselves, and that can be talked about in the mother as well and how it seems she is going through a mental illness that people see as a demon, and if she only got help she could be ok. However the ending shows us that this is not the case and unfortunately is just a theory I pulled together while watching.

This film is interesting, the horror aspect of it is definitely there as it is very unnerving and creepy, however the main source of that horror just didn’t fit very well for me. If you enjoy creepy slow burn horrors that are more independent and underground than you may very well enjoy this film, however I wish there were more bits that uncovered what these demons were that were affecting his family, and why so that I could understand their motive more.

What do you think of You Are Not My Mother?

Until next time.

Published by shonaharding

Media graduate with a passion for reviewing film and TV. View all posts by shonaharding