This is a somewhat sad, sweet little horror story produced by Guillermo Del Toro. It's very much in the vein of Pan's Labyrinth and The Devil's Backbone. Two little girls, Victoria (Megan Charpentier) and Lily (Isabelle Nelisse), are found in the woods after five years of being missing. The feral children are taken in by their uncle (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and his wife/girlfriend Annabel (Jessica Chastain). The girls' psychological care is looked over by Dr. Dreyfuss (Daniel Kash), who is hoping to get a book out of it. He is fascinated by Victoria's account that they were looked after by "Mama" who lives in the walls. He fears that Victoria has developed a dissociative identity to cope with the trauma but Annabel thinks Mama might be real. As they both get closer to the mystery, strange things start to happen.
The effects weren't as good as The Woman in Black although the story is very similar. Were it not for the emotional underpinnings, this would be easily dismissed as just another knockoff horror movie. The children really sell it hard, though, especially the conflicted Victoria. Lily is just bug-nuts, which has its own creepy charm. Coster-Waldau has the name recognition from Game of Thrones but he's very underutilized here. It's definitely a woman's horror film. I liked the mix of fantasy and reality at the end but Christy was confused by it. Rob didn't appreciate the number of jump scares but he's kind of a Nervous Nellie with that stuff.
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