Post by StevePulaski on Jun 2, 2019 17:09:01 GMT -5
Ma (2019)
Directed by: Tate Taylor
Directed by: Tate Taylor
Octavia Spencer is Sue Ann, also known as "Ma," in Ma.
Rating: ★★★
Months ago, one of my friends and coworkers was sharing his thoughts on last year's Halloween, many of which positive. But when he started making critical comments, some of which directed at moments at which he felt the story was being halted for broader, potentially unnecessary themes, he coined a phrase that made me laugh. "Just do the movie," he said somewhat cheekily, but still with some conviction. As someone privy to slang words and other witticisms, I found the phrase to have some substance. It's a fitting expression for when you might feel a film is veering off course from its intentions, or maybe too caught up in ideas it doesn't really know how to fittingly incorporate.
A great deal of Ma's success is that it so frequently does the movie. As a thriller in 2019, it should ostensibly feel inclined to feed the audience what they believe they came for: jump-scares and immediate gratification. But director/co-writer Tate Taylor and writer Scotty Landes prioritize the building blocks of story that make thrillers memorable and arresting. Above letting a slowburning dread overtake the simple premise, both allow characters to be fleshed out and suspense to arise, which effectively leads to a damn-good genre film. How lucky are we to get both Brightburn and Ma in the same month — two films that appear to understand such principles are often integral to making an unnerving piece of work?
The film opens with Maggie (Diana Silvers, Booksmart) and her mother Erica (Juliette Lewis) moving back to Erica's hometown in rural Ohio. Initially lonely, Maggie finds company in new friends, with whom she tries to buy alcohol from a liquor store one afternoon. With money and a fussed-over shopping list in hand, Maggie stops Sue Ann (Octavia Spencer), a vet tech, who agrees to supply her and her friends with fuel for their party.
The town is small enough for Maggie and her friends to bump into Sue Ann again, who, this time, not only buys them more handles of their favorite liquor, but also opens up her basement for the teens as a safe-space to drink, smoke, and canoodle with one another — all under the conditions that no one intoxicated drives home and no one goes upstairs. Sue Ann goes on to adopt the nickname "Ma," given to her by one of the teens for her presumably caregiving nature. But Ma soon becomes domineering over the teens, frequently sending them all text messages and Snapchat videos, giving off seriously disturbing vibes. A lifelong resident of her small community, Ma has a lot she's hiding from the teens, and Maggie begins to see through her ruse.
Octavia Spencer is so good and refined in her performance in Ma that she asserts a lurking presence over the film itself — one that you can feel grip the characters and mood tighter than a vise as the story progresses. Even when Ma isn't on-screen, Spencer makes the most of her scenes, emphasizing a lonely but welcoming exterior that hides an icy, vindictive interior. So much of Ma rests on her shoulders, and with over 20 years of diverse acting experience, she is absolutely experienced and talented enough to make it all come together.
I was primed to learn that after expressing interest in taking on a project that was "completely f***** up," Tate Taylor reached out to Spencer — who was angered about never being offered a leading role — the moment he got the opportunity. Here's an Oscar winning actress with a diverse portfolio of films under her belt, who is still second banana to a lot of other actresses without her repertoire. Not only does Spencer prove (as if there was any doubt) that she can carry a film, she also affirms her talents stretch far beyond dramas, as her devilish performance showcases her ability to play a two-faced character hellbent on exacting revenge. Props to Taylor and Landes for working on providing Spencer's Sue Ann with a believable backstory, for I was fearing another juicy premise would be served with little payoff.
Taylor and Landes' emphasis on building suspense through narrative while negating the urge to throw away a great premise with implausible twists. To add, the teens are a likable bunch, innocent enough to be smitten by a place with free booze and no adults, but not dumb enough to produce eye-rolls in response to their actions. Ma is a well-conceived thriller, one that has no problem abandoning cliches in order to take a mature, more promising high-road.
Starring: Octavia Spencer, Diana Silvers, Juliette Lewis, Luke Evans, McKaley Miller, Corey Fogelmanis, Gianni Paolo, Dante Brown, Missi Pyle, and Allison Janney. Directed by: Tate Taylor.