554: Ma

[00:00:00] 260. Let's get to Ma from 2019, which is directed by Tate Taylor, stars Octavia Spencer, Diana Silvers, Juliette Lewis, McKaylee Miller, Luke Evans, and the synopsis is,

[00:00:20] a lonely woman befriends a group of teenagers and decides to let them party at her house. Things start happening that make them question the intention of their host.

[00:00:33] Well, I decided to do this one because I did cover Tate Taylor's The Girl on the Train in the first collection of this series.

[00:00:42] I saw this one way, way back when, remembered little to nothing about it, so I almost count this as like a first time watch.

[00:00:50] I don't think the movie is that great. I think it's solid overall.

[00:00:58] This goes from really, really goofy, campy comedy, like when Octavia Spencer is dancing in the basement to Funky Town with all the high school kids,

[00:01:10] egging her on to really brutal, grim horror. And spoiler, warning.

[00:01:19] Even with all that though, what I appreciate the most about this is that it's an original story.

[00:01:27] The concept is interesting. I haven't really seen it done before.

[00:01:34] The Ma character played by Octavia Spencer is very memorable.

[00:01:39] The main storyline of this group of kids who are fairly normal teenagers, but they want to go and get drunk.

[00:01:50] But they keep on getting found out or followed by people in the town where everybody knows everybody so they can never really get away to do what they want to do.

[00:02:03] Then this Ma character comes along, says, hey, you know, why don't you come to my house? I have a basement.

[00:02:10] It's definitely is weird for someone to suggest that considering they're minors.

[00:02:15] But they could say, why not? And she seems super cool.

[00:02:22] You find out that she's had this very dark history of trauma in high school where this jock, cool kid, as well as his friend group, made her think he really liked her and wanted to be involved with her sexually and romantically.

[00:02:39] But then turns out that wasn't the case.

[00:02:43] I think how they set this up seems a little overdone, I think, for a movie that's I would say is trying to be mainly in a reality.

[00:02:55] They invite her to this party.

[00:02:58] The jock goes and talks to her, says, hey, why don't we do this? Why don't we do this?

[00:03:03] And then there's this fake blowjob scene of her going into this room in the high school, her thinking that she's giving this guy a blowjob turns out to be somebody else.

[00:03:17] And then she walks out and the whole class is waiting there to laugh at her.

[00:03:24] There's no backstory as to what she did, why they're picking on her.

[00:03:31] And sometimes there's no reason. That's what's terrible about bullying sometimes.

[00:03:37] And the guy says, well, how was it? And the other guy goes, oh, it was awesome.

[00:03:42] Genuinely, I thought not to say anything too crazy here, but like it is high school.

[00:03:50] A lot of people I knew during that time were very sexually active and doing a lot of crazy, stupid things publicly and, you know, just not being very smart when it comes to that.

[00:04:04] And then also, long story short, I was always struggling to think, OK, are we supposed to feel compassion for Ma?

[00:04:13] Are we supposed to find her charming?

[00:04:15] Are we supposed to be scared of her?

[00:04:18] Find her funny?

[00:04:20] It never really made that much sense.

[00:04:24] Which, not a big deal.

[00:04:27] Because when this story really gets going and Ma gets crazy, the creativity, the dark creativity, the imagination with what she does and the lengths that she goes to get revenge on not

[00:04:45] only the bullies themselves, but their children, which is this main group.

[00:04:50] For example, sewing the girl's mouth shut, the talkative girl, putting the clothing iron on the guy's chest, painting the black guy's face white,

[00:05:06] or even kissing the high school kid on the lips when he's trying to trick her, but she actually kisses the guy.

[00:05:15] And in that way, it's very creepy.

[00:05:17] And I mean, the whole thing has kind of a pedophile vibe, in my opinion.

[00:05:20] There's also the daughter of Ma, who she's intentionally making sick, so she doesn't go to school and can't be exposed to any trauma or bullies, nothing like that.

[00:05:35] So it reminds me a lot of the show The Act, as well as the movie Run with Sarah Paulson running the blonde woman down while she's jogging.

[00:05:51] Like that just came out of nowhere and it's so violent.

[00:05:53] I mean, effectively so.

[00:05:55] Like I was never against what they were doing.

[00:05:57] I was always impressed.

[00:06:00] And more than anything, it's entertaining.

[00:06:04] I think it's one that, whether you like it or not, it's worth watching.

[00:06:11] The performances across the board are solid.

[00:06:14] I like Luke Evans a lot.

[00:06:17] Octavia Spencer kills it in this, no pun intended.

[00:06:23] Some of the best comedy.

[00:06:26] When Octavia Spencer is trying to FaceTime with the high school group and say, hey, why didn't you come over to my house last night and drink?

[00:06:36] Why aren't you coming over on a school night to party?

[00:06:39] Like, what the hell?

[00:06:43] The killing of Luke Evans when she drains him of blood, or a lot of blood at least, on the bed when he's handcuffed.

[00:06:52] When she shoots the cop who is getting a little too close to discovering what's going on.

[00:07:00] There's not a lot of plot.

[00:07:03] The score and soundtrack are good.

[00:07:06] And it does a lot with a small budget.

[00:07:11] That one is a heavy three and a half out of five.

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