BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

SpuffyWeb Sadly Over-hyped

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Horst in Translation (filmreviews@web.de) "Mamá" is a short film by writer and director Andrés Muschietti and it runs for 3 minutes only and that already includes titles and about 25 seconds at the start before th film really starts. We see a girl move into her sister's room to tell her that her mother has returned. I quite liked the whole atmosphere in this one and the camera work was nicely done too and added a lot to the scare factor of this film. The second time that Mamá moves to the camera was a bit repetitive already still I have to admit. And I really did not understand why the sister would not let the other sister into the room before she was possessed. Anyway, still an okay short film and worth a watch for horror film fans. This short film was the basis of a full feature movie starring Jessica Chastain that Muschietti made 5 years later and which became quite popular. Unluckily for the three girls in here, they were not recast for that one. Still, they are doing a fine job here and all in all, I think the positive outweighs the negative. Recommended.

kosmasp What started off as a short, became a feature length movie. And Guillermo Del Toro was the one who saw the potential in the movie. In both movies so to speak. The general idea is simple and yet very horrifying. Having two children in peril will work most of the time. Shooting this like it is one take (great effects doing that and the other things in the movie) was genius too.Of course there are more takes, it's very complicated, but also very short and you get the feeling of dread and fear. Saying more about it, would spoil the "fun" you could have watching it. The good thing is, it doesn't matter if you watch this before watching the feature length movie or afterwards. The movie itself is kind of absorbed as one scene in the movie ... though it has a small difference ...

TxMike I saw this film short as an "extra" on the DVD for the feature length movie of the same name, by the same writers. The extra, with Del Toro's introductory comments, is about 5 minutes. The short film itself is right at 3 minutes.It's really only an idea, actually. We see two small girls in a large, two-story house. The atmosphere is spooky. Then we see the ghost figure "Mama" rushing towards the girls as they run up the stairs to safety. Hopefully.Del Toro came across this short and was impressed enough to contact the writers, a brother and sister team, to see if they might write a feature length film on the same theme.And they did, the 1 hour 40 minute horror movie "Mama." Which I enjoyed, BTW, even though it is not a genre that I am usually drawn to.

gavin6942 Little Victoria (Berta Ros) is waken up by her sister Lili (Victoria Harris) who insists on leaving the house because somebody unpleasant has come back.Although I watched this through the tainted point of view of seeing the feature film first, I think I can judge and review it objectively. (At least I hope so.) In this very short film, we have two little girls scared by an unknown entity. We do get to see this "Mama" a bit, and she is indeed something to fear. I actually think the effects look far better here than they do in the full-length version.This excels as a short film because it leaves us wondering: who are these girls, what is this Mama, and where are the parents? And despite leaving us with questions, it is very self-contained. The lack of plot is actually more effective than having a plot.