Fantastic Fest ’14 Review: GOODNIGHT MOMMY (ICH SEH, ICH SEH)

Rumors swirl like mad the day of a secret screening, up to the last minute before Drafthouse owner and Fantastic Fest founder Tim League comes out to introduce it. Mad Max: Fury Road, Kingsmen: The Secret Service, Jupiter Ascending, Stretch, Paranormal Activity 5, Area 51, Annabelle, and The Interview were all tossed around. Someone heard someone else say (you hear that a lot) that they saw the Wachowski’s in town and seeing as Cloud Atlas premiered secretly last year, Jupiter Ascending was as likely as any. Thing is, I thought I saw Lana Wachowski myself during the screening of Horns, but as it turns out there is at least one OTHER transsexual with colorful dreadlocks out there. So imagine our surprise as League came out and started talking about it being his favorite film that premiered at Toronto International Film Festival and all of our speculation immediately collapsed. By audible poll we all decided to just let the film play without knowing what it was.

Credits start popping up in in German with Austrian production companies and financiers listed. The film starts with two twin boys (Lukas and Elias Schwarz) chasing each other through a corn field, traveling over a marsh, and discovering a dark cave where one of the boys travels in. The whole time there is a swelling hum of dread and we have absolutely no clue what’s going to happen because we don’t even know what the movie is! The title arrives as Ich Seh, Ich Seh which confuses us more as 99% of us haven’t even heard the title. We then see the children at home and discovering their mother (Susanne Wuest) who’s bandaged up after having cosmetic surgery. She’s a media person of some kind, maybe a network anchor. Anyone with facial bandages is creepy though, right? She’s acting strange, and the boys are taking notice. Meanwhile they have a tank of hissing cockroaches as pets. One night, they put a cockroach on her face. They are certain that this person isn’t their mother. This is all I’ll tell you.

A lot of what made this special to the crowd was having no clue what they were getting themselves into, and the film is really fucked up. It’s a parent’s worst nightmare come to life, a thriller about trust and paranoia, and a deeply disturbing little flick that doesn’t a have a set path to follow. Even if you pick up on one of the secrets of the film early on, lest your brain just stops guessing and rolls with the punches, there’s no guessing where the film ends up, nor all the squirming you’ll do on your way there. The Schwarz brothers’ performances are perfect, but the powerhouse is Wuest. She embodies every fear that we feel as an audience in a heartbreaking, terrifying way, and it’s not an average character to get inside of so her transformation is extremely impressive.

This is a film that you will never forget. Ever. Learn nothing more, and see it as soon as you can, and watch out for Fiala and Franz who are officially hammered into my radar.