Sean Marshall Amazon released the first trailer & stills from their upcoming psychological thriller Goodnight Mommy.
When twin brothers (Cameron and Nicholas Crovetti) arrive at their Mother’s country home (Naomi Watts) to discover her face covered in bandages—the result, she explains, of recent cosmetic surgery—they immediately sense that something doesn’t add up. She sets strange new house rules, smokes in her bathroom, and secretly rips up a drawing they gave her—things their loving mother would never do. As her behavior grows increasingly bizarre and erratic, a horrifying thought takes root in the boys’ minds: the sinking suspicion that the woman beneath the gauze, who’s making their food and sleeping in the next room, isn’t their mother at all.
Goodnight Mommy is directed by Matt Sobel (Brand New Cherry Flavor, Take Me to the River) from a screenplay by Kyle Warren (Lethal Weapon, The Mysteries of Laura), based on the 2014 film Goodnight Mommy written and directed by Veronika Franz & Severin Fiala, produced by Ulrich Seidl. The film stars Naomi Watts (21 Grams, The Impossible), Cameron Crovetti (Big Little Lies, The Boys), Nicholas Crovetti (Big Little Lies, Salem’s Lot), Peter Hermann (Law & Order: SVU, Younger), Crystal Lucas-Perry (Law & Order: SVU, The Last O.G.) & Jeremy Bobb (The Knick, The Outsider).
The film is produced by V.J. Guibal (Sunset), Nicolas Brigaud-Robert (Sunset, À l’aventure), Joshua Astrachan (Paterson, The Dead Don’t Die), & David Kaplan (It Follows, It Comes at Night). Executive producers are Veronika Franz, Severin Fiala, Naomi Watts, Kyle Warren, Matt Sobel, Derrick Tseng (Joe, Brian Banks), Sébastien Beffa (Guest of Honour, Eye on Juliet), & François Yon (Sunset, Guest of Honour).
Director Matt Sobel said the following: “When I was first approached about directing an English-language remake of the 2014 Austrian horror thriller Goodnight Mommy, my initial response was to say no. I thought the film was incredibly visceral and extremely effective at engaging the audience, promoting a kind of active viewing experience that I really enjoyed. But I was wary of the notion of remaking a successful European arthouse film, which I saw as something that is done quite frequently but rarely very successfully. Upon further reflection, however, I became excited at the thought of creating a radically different kind of remake. The idea came more fully into focus during my initial conversations with screenwriter Kyle Warren. We saw the opportunity to do something that is quite common in theater but unusual in cinema: to adhere roughly to the original plot but reframe it in a way that completely changes its meaning — and perhaps even its genre. I liken it to restaging Shakespeare’s “The Taming of the Shrew” with a gender-reversed cast. Or re-harmonizing a familiar melody so that it evokes entirely different emotions. “
When speaking about the changes, this film has when compared to the original, Sobel said: “Some of the specific changes we made were to put one of the twin boys, Elias, at the center of the story, whereas the original largely treats the three main characters democratically. We wanted to bring the audience inside Elias’ experience, and to do so, chose to dramatize his thought processes. Another change was to create in the role of Mother — played with great nuance by the wonderful Naomi Watts — not a monster, but a flawed human being whose actions take on new meaning once the story’s core mystery is revealed. To do so involved weaving into her performance precise behaviors that make it clear there’s more going on than meets the eye — and to make those moments vivid enough that when the viewer reaches the end of the film, they don’t need to immediately return to the beginning to understand what happened. (That said, some viewers may find rewatching the film in the context of the ending offers its own rewards.) Our film also isn’t as brutally violent as the original. It’s not, as one critic said of the Austrian version, “the stuff nightmares are made of.” It aims for something different, but hopefully no less satisfying.”
Goodnight Mommy will premiere on Amazon Prime Video on September 16, 2022.
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