Mum & Dad (2008)

Young Polish immigrant office cleaner Lena (a fine and convincing performance by Olga Fedori) finds herself imprisoned in the dingy fortress-like home of a deranged family headed by the monstrous Dad (a frighteningly intense performance by Perry Benson) and his sadistic spouse Mum (well played with bloodcurdling calm by Dido Miles).Writer/director Steven Shel grounds the grim and gripping premise in a plausibly drab and sordid everyday reality, ably crafts a bleak and nasty tone, puts a welcome and refreshing emphasis on creepy characters and uncomfortable suffocating atmosphere over cheap scares and excessive graphic gore (the bulk of the savage violence is implied rather than explicitly shown), and explores the more perverse, dysfunctional, and claustrophobic aspects of working class family life with a fiercely unwavering clarity. Moreover, this movie not only acquires an extra potent and unnerving edge from the fact that everything that happens in the story remains within the realm of possibility, but also makes powerful and provocative points about both the ruthless extremes people will resort to in order to survive and the foul corrupting influence bad parents can have on their children. Benson and Miles are positively staggering in their grotesque behavior; they receive sturdy support from Ainsley Howard as jealous conniving bitch Birdie and Toby Alexander as mute catatonic Elbie. A real flesh-crawling pip.

Being the Horror freak that I am, I've had my share of what popular criticism dubs as "torture porn". And I must say I'm not the least a fan of it, but I can still appreciate it when it's done right. To be honest, Mum & Dad maintains a delicate and almost accurate balance between physical and mental torture, done both to the protagonist and the audience.The build up is short and quick, and the plot does very little more than simply exist. Much like the protagonist, we the audience are presented with the situation and forced to accept it as reality, and there's very little in between. The film has some pretty sick, twisted and deranged scenes, and is not for the feint of heart or week of stomach.The screenplay is I guess rather good, for a film with so few events. The cinematography is OK but slightly boring, and the acting is impressive. Then again, as I've said, I'm no fan of torture films, so it's very hard for me to judge.All in all - think Ketchum's The Girl Next Door meets I Spit on Your Grave. Mum & Dad is one of the better torture films I've seen, and yet I remain a fan of true Horror films.

I just rented Mum & Dad off of the Playstation Network Store for 99 cents and i must say, it was literally worth every penny. I went into this movie thinking it was going to be just another un-original indi horror movie with barbaric murder scenes and well, i was half wrong. The film has lots of murders and deaths but only some of them are disturbing (or at least to myself) but the film focused on more of the pshycological part of being kid napped and the process of breaking free and just how much it really does change your life, and they do a great job on introducing the characters and letting us know (without directly saying) which ones are sadistic killer/crazy and which ones are just lost in the picture, and they do a fabulous job on making you care for the main character. Now enough about the good stuff, of course it got redundant after a while of hearing "how important family is" and "to obey your orders" and "do as your told" all that stuff gets old really fast and that is really one of the only things that i didn't like about the film is some of the pointless dialogue. Now the Dad in the film i think has a great screen presence and really stole the show. Its a good "friday night flick" but not a classic. But i suggest it too any true horror fan. 6/10 Enjoy

Polish immigrant Lena finds herself tricked into and trapped in the house(where most of this is set) of the volatile and knife-happy "mum" and "dad"(and no, the tubby dude will scare you), and her "siblings", where scarring, draconian punishments for disobedience and the like are commonplace. Could she possibly make it out of the experience alive? This is a mix of torture porn and psychological thriller. It's disgusting, perverted(albeit far from the worst out there, in that regard; there is sexual content, and it's pretty unappealing), gory, bloody and disturbing. The pacing is reasonable, and although it can be brutal and thus difficult to watch, it doesn't strain your patience(note that it does "feel" like our lead is stuck in a hopeless situation for a rather long period of time - as denoted by the incessant shots of planes passing by, as the "family" live near the airport), during the 80-minute running time, sans credits. This is well-acted, and the character development is pretty good. You know a lot about these people without much other information than behaviour. One thing is that we don't actually get an explanation for the actions of the parent couple. This can be quite creepy, and it tends to be effective. Editing and cinematography are nice, they really build a mood. The DVD comes with three trailers, one of them for this, the other two being for Spread and Laid to Rest, respectively. I recommend this to fans of this kind of film. 7/10