HORROR MOVIE REVIEW: ​MOTHERLY

Overall Motherly is a decent home-invasion, revenge thriller with a good cast, it is just let down by signposting the twists so heavily.

​Motherly
Written by Ian Malone and Craig David Wallace
Directed by Craig David Wallace
Kate (Lora Burke) and her daughter Beth live alone in an isolated farmhouse in the woods, but when Kate slowly begins to suspect that something sinister is happening, her motherly instincts are put to the test.(IMDB)

A Horror Movie Review by Mark Walker 

Some very mild plot spoilers for Motherly follow.

Kate and her daughter Beth (Tessa Kozma) have a strained relationship. We are introduced to the pair on Beth’s birthday, and she isn’t happy. She doesn’t like her presents, she doesn’t want her cake, and her mum won’t play hide and seek with her. There is no sign of her father, and it soon becomes clear that they are on their own, in witness protection, while he languishes in jail for killing one of Beth’s friends during a game of hide and seek.

No wonder Kate doesn’t want to play it.

With Beth’s frustrating behaviour and a local cop sniffing around, it is unsurprising that Kate’s nerves are shredded, and she is on the edge emotionally. So, when odd things start happening and she begins to see mysterious figures around the property, we know her life is going to get a lot worse very quickly.

And they do when the parents of the murdered child, Mary (Kristen MacCulloch) and Lewis (Nick Smyth) invade Kate’s home seeking revenge for their dead daughter.


The hatred that drives Mary is matched by the protective instincts of Kate and we get a tense game of cat and mouse where the upper hand changes back and forth. Kate works hard to save herself and protect Beth who is hunted through the house by Lewis, while Mary fights to get a confession out of Kate and get justice for her daughter. It’s all about family and how far you would go for yours. Cop, Hal (Colin Paradine) is also thrown into the mix and offers a potential life-line, although if the appalling response time of his back-up is anything to go by, justice isn’t coming for anyone anytime soon. The whole situation is a mess and, as the story unravels, it is clear that there are unlikely to be any winners in this confrontation.

It’s a promising set-up and, while not necessarily original, there are a couple of twists in Motherly that should have made it a better film than it is.

The film wants to be twisty and turny, obfuscating events and relegating the truth to snippets of information revealed slowly in flashbacks scattered throughout the film. However, Motherly screws itself over. For a film that has two quite substantial twists in its tail, they are pretty obvious and signposted early on in the film. While the flashbacks slowly reveal what happened on the fateful day of the murder, saving the final reveal for the very end, a single line of dialogue early on gives the game away and all potential for surprise was lost for me.

Which is soooo frustrating because the rest of the film is great. It is a solid thriller, and the cast all do a fantastic job, wringing plenty of emotion from their performances as the pain of past events fuels their anger and behaviour. Kate is a mother fighting for her life and for her daughter as Mary and Lewis ooze despair, their entire world having collapsed around them; they are singularly focussed on their desire for revenge. Every character has believable motivation.
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And Beth is a standout. Tessa Kozma plays a troubled pre-teen to perfection. At times she is angry, other times sarcastic, but all the time she gives an impressive performance as she butts up against her mother, the pair of them clearly suffering from the trauma of moving away from home and husband/dad being in prison. All the time, you feel there is something not quite right with her and she seems wise beyond her years; there is definitely something going on behind the eyes.


The direction is great, making the best of the cast and using the confusing architecture of the house to good measure. Motherly has some effective creepy moments in the first act that help build the sense of dread as the film gets into its stride. I don’t know what the budget for Motherly was, but I don’t think it was large. However, Craig David Wallace has produced a film that belies its low budget origins.
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Overall Motherly is a decent home-invasion, revenge thriller with a good cast, it is just let down by signposting the twists so heavily. The ending saves it a little and, while the main story is wrapped up, there is fun to be had thinking about where it might go next as we fade out from the final images. Despite the fairly big fumble in relation to the plot twists, I still had fun with Motherly and would happily recommend it to anyone who enjoys a home invasion/revenge thriller. At just 80 minutes, what have you got to lose? (Apart from 80 minutes, smart arse.)

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