This is going to be a fairly short review. The less you know before getting into Goodnight Mommy the better.

Goodnight Mommy is an Austrian slow burn horror directed by Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz. It starts by showing us twin boys at home waiting for their mother to come back from an operation. But when mother arrives home with a bandaged face and starts acting sterner than ordinary, the boys begin to suspect that maybe she is not actually their mother and they start to push back.

The fantastic thing about Goodnight Mommy is how much the film demands your attention. Scenes unfold without context or backstory. Questions like, where is the father and what was the operation for all get answered, but Fiala and Franz show they are in no hurry to dish out all of the details. Goodnight Mommy takes full advantage of its ambiguity, intentionally leaving us to second-guess what the truth is. But in the end, our patience is rewarded.

Horror fans will also appreciate Goodnight Mommy’s willingness to get nasty, but its nastiness is used sparingly. For the first hour, you may even question if you are watching a horror movie at all. But when the horror starts, Fiala and Franz do not hold back and the result is quite impactful.

Also, the acting in this film is superb. Susanne Wuest does an excellent job in her role as the mother, but the true stars of this film are the twin brothers, played by Elias and Lukas Schwartz (There first names are also the names used in the film.). The interactions between the pair comes across as natural and its hard to doubt their bond, both in the movie and in real life. Elias and Lukas do an excellent job acting in unison, as many believe twins do, and this makes them seem more formidable to confront despite their young age.

In the end, Goodnight Mommy is a fully realized film experience. Fiala and Franz had a clear vision for this film and they execute it to perfection. There is nothing about this film I would ever want changed. The film works as a subtle psychological thriller, but its horrors also lend themselves to other genres. (But I won’t speak more about this for fear of spoilers.)  As modern horror filmmakers, Fiala and Franz may not get the same respect as Aster or Eggers, but their follow-up, The Lodge, which serves as kind of a thematic companion piece to this film, shows that they are a directorial pair worth our attention. 

Simply put, Goodnight Mommy is an example of modern horror filmmaking at its finest and it is a must watch for all fans of mature horror.