PLOT: When Elias and Lukas go to live with their mother, they begin to suspect that the woman with bandages on her face may not be their mother.
Remember the movie The Changeling where the mother suspects that the boy that was returned to her is an impostor.
Well, Goodnight Mommy is sort of like that but twisted around a bit. This time the kids think their mother is an impostor.
Why? Because she has bandages all over her face. And that means that without a face, there is no other way to tell if a person is your family member or not. There is no other discerning feature in the body that can help anyone identify their close ones.
Not the hands, not a mole or a scar, or body shape or something on the toes perhaps.
Anyway, the kids begin to believe that an impostor is living in the house with them and they must find a way to get to the bottom of the mystery of what happened to their mother.
Now in the original version of the movie that came out in 2014, the twins actually go to extreme lengths to get the woman in bandages to admit her true identity.
The remake of the movie is not quite shocking and that should have been a good thing for fans of horror who can't stomach every movie. The problem is that this new version is also quite dull and ineffective in bringing forth the tension.
It becomes predictable and the character which was supposed to be sinister comes off as meek.
GOODNIGHT MOMMY PLOT
Elias and Lukas are being dropped off by their father at their mother's house.
The twins are stunned to find a woman wearing a balaclava over her head. As if that isn't enough, their mother warns them to not come to her bedroom, office, and barn.
Some welcome the kids...
The twins are already put off by all these rules and the fact that their mother doesn’t seem overly pleased and is behaving a little off.
But there are the fields to run about in at least.
When Elias asks his mother to sing a lullaby, she makes excuses and when Elias makes a drawing of him, Lukas, and their mother, he finds it torn later.
It is then that the twins begin to suspect that the person under the bandages may not be their mother.
Uh oh...
But how does one know for sure whether the person living with them in the house is their mother or not?
These are twins after all and they don't believe that adults can have an off day or an off month sometimes.
Nope. Their mother didn't sing them a lullaby and hated their drawing. Their mother wasn't like that.
Elias then overhears their mother talking to someone about being unable to go on pretending and wishing he would go away.
The next day the twins find a headshot of their mother and *shocked* finds that their mother has green eyes.
Apparently, the twins forgot the color of their mother's eyes or maybe she never took her contacts in front of them?
Elias calls up their father, getting suspicious about the woman not being their mother but the mother finds out and breaks the cell phone.
Okay, red flags right there. Why is she so angry?
Elias has had it. He wants to see the woman under the bandages.
The woman has been dancing about in her gown and admiring her figure but when she comes to the face, she feels bad and stops the music immediately.
It's bath time now and Elias has decided to spy on his mother who has removed the bandage balaclava and has put on some face mask.
When Elias thinks his mother has dozed off, he creeps up quietly to her and starts to remove the mask only for the mother to catch the hand mid-air and scream at him.
When he yells out he doesn’t think she's his mother, she slaps him hard enough for him to cut his lip. Then she forces him to admit that she is his mother.
The twins decide enough is enough and plan to run away in the middle of the night. They take shelter in a nearby house but are easily found by two police officers. What they say doesn’t mean a thing to them as they are kids.
They are put in a car and driven home to the mother who has removed her bandages.
No way is she going to spend the rest of the movie hiding her face.
The officers inquire about Elias' cut lip but the mother tells them about how clumsy kids can be around swimming pools.
The officers buy all of this because they are huge fans of the mother who was an actress. She refuses to take a selfie but promises them autographed headshots and Blu-Rays of her movies.
The officers don't care a thing about what the boys say now.
Bye!
The boys realize they must rely on themselves now.
GOODNIGHT MOMMY Ending Explained with Spoilers
The next morning, the mother wakes up to find herself tied to the bed. Elias demands to know where their mother is.
The mother keeps telling them that it is her but Elias tells her about her eyes being a different color.
The mother grows exasperated and tells Elias she is an actress and has to wear contact lenses for work. She even tells him to check her purse for the contacts.
No dice. The twins don't believe it. Elias sends Lukas to check the purse and he says he didn't find it.
Elias goes over and throws a bucket of cold water on the "mother". She still doesn’t budge and keeps telling him that she is the mother.
Elias starts to feel bad about subjecting his mother to torture but doesn’t let her go.
Lukas urges him to come and run away. Elias follows through but at the last second, he decides to check the purse and lo and behold, he finds the green contact lenses.
Elias rushes off to untie his mother while Lukas tries to dissuade him. When Elias ignores him and unties the mother, Lukas disappears.
That's when the mother reveals the truth. Lukas doesn’t exist. He's been dead this whole time. The mother takes Elias to the barn to recall the incident when he accidentally shot his brother. The blood and the woman in the barn, all of it had been memories Elias had been trying to suppress but he kept seeing.
Elias is in disbelief and stunned by the revelation. He accidentally pushes his mother and she falls from the loft. There is a lantern that shatters and sets the hay on fire. Elias escapes as the barn burns down.
He sees his mother and Lukas, who is holding a stuffed toy for some reason.
They all embrace.
It's a happy ending...but only in Elias' mind.
Either Elias has survived and hallucinated his family or he is dead too and finally reunited with his family.
Scare Scale: 2.5/5
Check out this movie on Amazon Prime Video
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