Good Madam

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Good Madam
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A Lot or a Little?
The parents' guide to what's in this movie.
What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that Good Madam is a 2022 psychological horror movie in which a woman suspects sinister forces are lurking in the house where her mother works as a live-in domestic servant. This is a South African movie that explores themes of apartheid, colonialism, and the racial and economic tensions and disparity that remain. It's a slow-burn suspense movie, filled with jump scares and creepy imagery before culminating in more disturbing scenes. In nightmare visions, the lead character sees her hand fall off while she's brushing her teeth, followed by blood. In another instance of tooth brushing, the woman loses control of her hand as it forces the toothbrush in and out of her mouth, causing her to choke and gag. There's a stabbing death, and knife wounds to the hand. A woman is forcibly held down while another woman vomits on her. Some infrequent language includes "f--k." Cigarette smoking occurs. Characters speak Xhosa and some English.
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What's the Story?
In GOOD MADAM, Tsidi (Chumisa Cosa) and her daughter, Winnie, move in with her mother, Mavis. Mavis (Nosipho Ntebe) works as a live-in domestic servant in a Cape Town mansion for a now-bedridden White woman named Diane. Mavis has now lived there for decades, and balks at the suggestion of finding a way to put Diane into assisted living. While never feeling at home in her many visits to her mother in this mansion while growing up, Tsidi now especially feels out of place, but also feels a sense of evil lurking in the artifacts on the tables and the photographs on the walls. She begins to feel as if there's something that her mother isn't telling her about Diane and about the house, and it connects to Tsidi's own awareness of Black workers like her mother being made to feel as if they're part of the wealthy White families for whom they work when the reality is rooted in the injustices and condescension inherent in apartheid and colonialism. Tsidi must find a way to find out what's really happening in the house between her mother and Diane and escape the mansion before it sucks her and her daughter in completely.
Is It Any Good?
This is a maddening psychological horror movie with a powerful message on apartheid and colonialism in South Africa. Good Madam uses the suspense of the genre to explore how power dynamics, economic disparity, and institutional racism continue to alter the lives and relationships between Blacks and Whites in that country, although it's easy to extrapolate these dynamics to other countries. While Tsidi feels alienated from the mansion where her mother, Mavis, has worked for so many years, her half-brother was raised in the mansion and seems to have assimilated so thoroughly that Tsidi calls him a "coconut." When Tsidi and her daughter, Winnie, move in after the death of Tsidi's grandmother, Tsidi tells Winnie that "it's not that Momma doesn't like the house, it's that the house doesn't like Momma."
What emerges, unfortunately -- and this is what makes it so maddening -- is a message without a story. In lulls in interactions, the movie spends time focusing on old photographs on the walls à la The Shining, or extreme close-ups and exaggerated sound effects of Mavis or Tsidi cleaning. It all has a point, but with a slow-burn movie like this, you want the payoff to be worth it. By the time the movie hits the climax, it feels unsatisfying. The movie keeps hinting at actual scares, but none are forthcoming. It's a disappointing experience, because there's a lingering sense that this should be better than it is.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the deeper messages behind Good Madam. What are these messages? How are they communicated through the story?
How is this similar to and different from other horror movies you've seen? Do you think jump scenes are scarier than blood and gore? Why, or why not?
What are some other examples of horror and suspense movies that seem to start slow before the scares happen? How does the "slow burn" build suspense?
Movie Details
- In theaters: September 27, 2022
- On DVD or streaming: July 14, 2022
- Cast: Chumisa Cosa, Nosipho Mtebe, Kamvalethu Jonas Raziya
- Director: Jenna Cato Bass
- Studio: Shudder
- Genre: Horror
- Topics: Magic and Fantasy, History, Monsters, Ghosts, and Vampires
- Run time: 92 minutes
- MPAA rating: NR
- Last updated: July 11, 2022
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