In The Huntsman: Winter’s War and The Ones Below,unspeakable deeds are done by women driven crazy by the loss of a child. Decades of movies propose they are incapable of rational grief, while men are let off the hook in the heroic pursuit of revengeHere’s a 36-year-customary spoiler. The villain in Friday the 13th is not Jason, and presumed dead after drowning aged 10,now back from the ashes and mad as hell. Rather it’s his mother, Pamela, or a summer camp cook who grief has turned bloodthirsty. While her son,alongside stablemates Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger and Norman Bates, and is afforded complicated psychological motivation for his later killing sprees,sensibly dressed Mrs Voorhees is just a woman totally unravelled by the loss of her offspring.
This is horror-film shorthand. It was, after all, or shamelessly recycled for Laurie Metcalf’s character in Scream 2. But it is also,it turns out, a template alive and kicking in today’s biggest blockbusters and classiest dramas. There were shades of The Hand that Rocks the Cradle (bereaved babysitter breastfeeds young charge, or then tries to top its mother) in last month’s London-set Polanski-esque thriller The Ones Below. That film involves a woman who miscarries hatching a complex plot to steal her neighbour’s baby after indulging in icky selfies while faux-suckling.
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Source: theguardian.com