On one hand -- I want to say this film is like the Art of Japanese gardening. Simple and beautiful. Balanced. Proportioned. There's just the right amount of everything that should go into an action movie: car chases, explosions,, an invincible hero/heroine, bullets, pectoral muscles, ect...
On the other hand, "The Mother" is a generic action thriller that slightly redeems itself with some decent performances and thematic explorations of a mother-daughter relationship. But its predictability and sub-par writing make it a one-time watch at best. We left it playing in the background the other night. Every minute counts! So I was kind of tuned in and out.
I loved aspects of the movie the first time, mainly the emotional moments between Lopez and Paez, highlighting the complexities of a mother-daughter relationship. It plays on a mother’s instinct and drives to protect her offspring in a Jason Bourne-esque setting which is quite interesting to witness, but it was also 2am so i was also fighting sleep and everything just seemed long! Lol!
After a second watch I was able to pay more attention to the details and understand and feel the mother-daughter bond, as well as the background story with her exes better. There's still some script and pacing issues for me as well as character building flaws. In fact, the script is quite cliché like The Mother’s dislocated arm. So painful to watch! OMG, and the supporting characters lack development, Gael was underused. I also felt that there were scenes that could have been cut and they would've gotten a much tighter film. So yea, it was waaaaaaay too long, but after watching it again it didn't take away from the movie as much as I had initially felt that it had.
For a Netflix action thriller, I enjoyed it for what it was. Nice for a night of cinema in the house to watch on your love seat or in bed, that's it.
I'll admit the critics almost buried my excitement to watch it. Not sure what in the hell they were expecting. It's a fairly run of the mill action flick with Jen from the block.
Granted, we all need to watch films sometimes purely for the sake of entertainment - not every film has to have the realism of Platoon, the moral dilemmas of Hamlet, or the meticulous accuracy of Gandhi. If you're going in expecting it to win 10 Oscars including best picture and director, then you’ll be really disappointed. However, if you go in expecting "Taken" except the mother’s the one with the specific set of skills instead of the father then you’ll be somewhat, if not, perfectly satisfied or not at all. :)-_ghostie gal