You Are Not My Mother (2021)
Directed by Kate Dolan

Kate Dolan’s You Are Not My Mother is impressive for its moody atmosphere and possesses a couple of notable performances but I’m not at all convinced of the laurels afforded it since its premiere at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival. The film involves three generations of Irish women, the teen Char (Hazel Doupe), her depressed mother Angela (Carolyn Bracken), and her grandmother Rita (Ingrid Craigie). They share a dilapidated home where the three function separate from each other, forcing Char to mostly fend for herself as she contends with bullying at school. Char’s mother vanishes only to return suddenly, the once beleaguered sot now beginning to behave erratically, as if possessed by a demon. What follows is a litany of half-realized Irish lore melding with Twitter-level psychoanalysis that never really amounts to anything thoughtful; The Babadook this is not. The prevailing sentiment is that Angela’s bipolar disorder functions as a literal demon within the bloodline of the family, but this is all depicted as a kind of Joker-esque fever dream. The craft will impress, but I’m not persuaded that this has anything meaningful to say, instead camouflaging ill-conceived mental health discourse in an effort to “elevate” its horror.