Scary Mother

From one day to the next, 50-year-old Manana stops fulfilling her role as a wife, mother, and daughter and all the obligations that go hand in hand with it in order to follow her dream of being a writer: a decision that seems entirely outrageous to her family, not least when they realize that Manana’s writing is unflinchingly autobiographical. At night, she dreams of transforming into a blood-sucking monster from Filipino mythology which attacks pregnant women. The only person to offer encouragement is her publisher. A woman’s emancipation takes the form of a psychological horror film in Ana Urushadse’s striking debut, which uses an expressive color palette, a claustrophobically depicted high rise estate, and suggestive sound design to blur the boundaries between reality and fiction.