Mother's Day (2010) [Blu-ray]
Crime | Drama | Horror | Thriller

Hailed as "I Spit On Your Grave mixed with Texas Chainsaw Massacre" (Mark L. Miller, AICN Horror) Mother's Day is a graphic remake of the Troma horror classic, Mother's Day. After a bank robbery gone wrong, three brothers go home to hideout - only to discover that their Mother (Rebecca De Mornay) lost their house in a foreclosure. The new owners and their party guests become the depraved brothers' unwitting hostages. Their sadistic Mother soon arrives and brilliantly takes control of the situation, ratcheting up the terror. As the hostages struggle desperately to survive the harrowing torture, they realize that there is nothing a Mother won't do to protect her children.

User Comment: ladiesman228 from United Kingdom, 5 May 2011 • I haven't seen the original Troma film of which this is based, but I've been looking forward to this one and it was worth the wait! The movie is very well paced, were thrown straight into the horror in the first 10 Min's (and this being a film by Darren Lynn Bousman (saw 2,3,4), there is plenty of horror on show)! Were barely introduced to the characters when the blood starts pouring, but i still found myself caring for each of them! With no sense of what was going to happen next or who was going to die, i was permanently on the edge of my seat! The show belongs to De Mornay, her performance as Mother is as chilling as Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs, cool and calm on second but deadly the next. With some memorable deaths, each totally unexpected, and a few twists along the way, i found this film a real surprise and one every horror fan especially should check out!

Summary: Best I've Seen in a Long Time.

User Comment: Coventry from the Draconian Swamp of Unholy Souls, 25 April 2011 • Now THIS is the type of horror movie remake that I – and surely many other avid genre fanatics with me – certainly don't mind seeing! The new film by Darren Lynn Bousman, who should have turned his back on the "Saw" franchise much sooner, is loosely based on a 1980 flick with the same title. The original "Mother's Day" is an extremely low-budgeted and trashy production from the infamous Troma Studios. That film is obscure and totally insignificant, but at least the basic premise shows enough potential to entertain audiences even 30 years later. I really wished this is how horror remakes were usually handled. There's absolutely no necessity to recycle near-perfect classics such as "A Nightmare on Elm Street" or "The Fog". We need more directors who dig up forgotten gems and unleash an updated and vastly superior version!

"Mother's Day" basically your average thriller about a bunch of people getting home jacked and then subsequently submitted to humiliation, torture and emotional agony. The difference here, however, lies with the entire cast of characters. The homejackers are a totally unseen kind of dysfunctional family and yet the victims are often even more antipathetic. You know, the type of obnoxious and cowardly people prepared to sacrifice their so-called friends in order to save themselves. On the same night a tornado is about to pass through the area and cause a lot of damage, three brothers are on the lam after a failed bank robbery. The youngest one has a lethal bullet wound in his stomach and the three seek shelter in their nearby parental house. Unfortunately, their mother and sister were evicted a couple of months earlier and the house now belongs to Dan and Beth Sohapi, who're just having their friends over for a party. The Koffin brothers take the entire bunch hostage, but then their mommy arrives… Mother Koffin is an intelligent and sophisticated mature woman but, as to be expected, also a deeply disturbed and dangerous psychopath. The homejackers will not hesitate to kill, but the large amount of lies and deceits between the owners and their guests threatens to destroy them even sooner.

"Mother's Day" is an exciting and occasionally even suspenseful horror tale full of gruesome torture/murder sequences and pitch black humor. It has to be said that, with a running time of 112 minutes, the film is a tad overlong and suffers from a few tedious moments near the finale. By that time, even the remarks and behavioral ticks of the mother are becoming a bit derivative. Speaking of which, the titular role means an awesome comeback for early 90's vixen Rebecca De Mornay. She was hot in that period thanks to popular thrillers like "Guilty as Sin", "Never Talk to Strangers" and especially "The Hand that Rocks the Cradle" in which she already portrayed a lunatic nanny. De Mornay hasn't starred in anything significant in nearly 15 years, but now she's back and she looks more ravishing than ever. "Mother's Day" contains numerous bloody and hard-to-stomach images, including the eerie intro set in a hospital and a couple of excruciatingly painful confrontations between victims and kidnappers, so it will definitely be popular amongst young horror fanatics. The film does lack that typically raw and brutal edge, but you can hardly blame Darren Lynn Bousman for that, because true exploitation films are nearly impossible to come by these days. As stated before, this is the second film in which the young director showcases his exceptionally talented skills. This and particularly "Repo! The Genetic Opera" are really cool movies and I hope Bousman doesn't return to the long-extinct "Saw" series.

Summary: The Hand That Messed Up Many Cradles!

[CSW] -3.2- Mother's Day is a relentless and brutal journey. While it does feature superb acting, spot-on cinematography, and top notch make-up effects, it just seems to be missing something to really make you feel for these characters and the sadistically tragic experience they were just put through. It's like the film is lacking just an ounce of compassion or doesn't have genuine human qualities correctly balanced out to pull you in. However even though you may not care that much about the characters the tension between all of them continues to mount throughout the whole movie, somehow keeping you on the edge of your seat from the beginning to end of this film. That palpable tension supported by the escalating torture used to create sheer horror are so well balanced that this movie deserves more credit than the lack of empathy for the characters would normally allow for. If you aren't constantly squiring in you seat then you haven't been paying attention to this carefully orchestrated crescendo of horror.
[V4.5-A4.0] MPEG-4 AVC - No D-Box.

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