Anne Hathaway (left) and Jessica Chastain star in Mothers’ Instinct. Photo: Supplied.
Academy Award-winning actresses Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain lead the cast in Mothers’ Instinct, a tense psychological thriller in which two mothers, who are best friends and neighbours, slowly turn against each other when tragedy strikes.
It is a remake of Olivier Masset-Depasse’s 2018 French-language film, which itself was an adaptation of the 2012 novel Mothers’ Instinct (French: Derrière la haine or Behind the Hatred), by Barbara Abel.
Céline Jennings (Hathaway, Les Misérables, The Intern, Rachel Getting Married) and Alice Bradford (Chastain, The Help, Zero Dark Thirty, Miss Sloane) live an idyllic traditional lifestyle with spotless interiors, manicured lawns, successful husbands and sons who are the same age.
However, life’s perfect harmony is suddenly shattered after a tragic accident. Paranoia, guilt and suspicion merge to unravel their sisterly bond and an emotional battle of wills begins as the maternal instinct reveals its darker side.
Alice stages a surprise party for Céline’s birthday. The next day, Céline’s son, Max (Baylen D. Bielitz), stays home sick from school. Alice, pruning roses in her own garden, spots Max standing precariously on a balcony, trying to hang a birdhouse he made at school.
Alice, realising the danger, tries to crawl through a small tunnel-like break in the hedge separating the two properties, but her large sunhat prevents her from doing so quickly. She then runs around the hedge to reach the front door and attempts to alert Céline, who is inside vacuuming.
The two are unable to act quickly enough and Max falls to his death. This spawns a web of disbelief, deceit and murder.
After her son’s death, Céline distances herself from Alice, but grows closer to Alice’s son, Theo (Eamon O’Connell).
Hathaway and Chastain excel in their roles, giving fascinating performances. Their portrayal of Céline and Alice’s disintegrating friendship is a highlight, depicting instants of support, betrayal and doubt with subtlety.
Simon (Anders Danielsen Lie, Reprise, Oslo, August 31st, The Worst Person in the World) is Alice’s husband. Damian (Josh Charles, The Good Wife, Dead Poets Society, Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead) is Celine’s husband. Their roles are minimal, with characters not being developed enough to make meaningful contributions to the story.
Depicting the perfect 1960s suburban American life, the film’s fastidiously crafted visual style outspreads to its settings as well. There’s a dreamlike quality to the neighbourhood where Alice and Céline live.
As beautiful as it looks, there’s an artificial quality, a feeling of disconnect from the story’s emotive heart. Due to the film’s intense focus on visual aesthetics, there are times when it weakens in evolving as a cogent demonstrative narrative. The film’s tone is accurately described as swinging between “intense melodrama and near-parody”.
Although visually punctilious, vibrant flair is absent from what is expected from Benoît Delhomme’s cinematographic background. Nonetheless, in what is Delhomme’s (A Most Wanted Man, Lawless ) directorial debut, he takes advantage of the implements at his disposal to breathe life into the narrative through the costumes and cinematography, which is undeniably striking.
Even Benoît acknowledges that what Chastain’s Alice and Hathaway’s Céline brought together “was so beautiful, and their chemistry was so good”.
“Anne and Jessica, I didn’t try to redirect them,” he said. “I was observing them. I wanted to give them freedom to express the characters they had built in their head.”
Mothers’ Instinct is not for the faint-hearted. It presents a charismatic yet blemished take on a suburban thriller. In one of the earlier scenes, Alice and Céline talk about what each of them wants from life. What either of them is thinking is not quite clear, but Céline is the content one. Alice wants more than just a homemaker’s life.
Sarah Conradt’s subtle screenplay injects an interesting observation about how sexism of the past still exists in the present, though in different ways.
Mothers’ Instinct, directed by Benoît Delhomme, is streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
