You Are Not My Mother: When Horror Becomes a Family Secret
When You Are Not My Mother was first presented at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2021. It is a film by Kate Dolan, an Irish director, and, in contrast with most horror films, it is not about the sudden shock of a gruesome kill. It is not about aiming for a profuse display of blood, gore, and body parts. It is not about distracting the viewer with a sudden, murderous explosion of sound. It is about the creepy, slow, and unrelieved focus on terror.
It is about the terror that emerges from an enclosed, claustrophobic family situation. It is possibly about the terror that is confined within the Irish cultural and folk tradition. It is a psychological horror, yet it is a film that speaks about the involvement of identity, the experience of motherhood, and the juxtaposed legacies of trauma. It was not long before the film inspired fan theories on social media, ambiguous YouTube breakdowns, and tense Reddit discussions.
A Story That Burns Slowly
A grey, uneasy corner of Dublin,You Are Not My Mother, follows Char (performed by Hazel Doupe) a lonely school girl living with her unstable mother, Angela (performed by Carolyn Bracken). A scene in, something is off. Angela’s mental health seems to deteriorate further — day dreaming, forgetting appointments, withdrawing from her daughter — and then one day, she simply vanishes.
Both Char and her grandmother assume the worst. But when Angela, seemingly unharmed, comes back. something about her has changed. She has a warmer and more present, almost glowing, and yet erratic and unnerving. Her smiles linger, her movements become offbeat. The dog starts barking at her and her appetite of life — and other things — become frightenly literal.
As Char starts noticing the bruises, flickering lights, and whispering about changelings, the movie shifts from family drama to folklore horror. The question at the film’s core isn’t simply what happened to her mother, but rather who — or what — returned instead.
The Myths Behind the Madness
The rich undercurrent of the film comes from Dolan’s choice to focus the horror of the tale on Irish mythology. The changeling tale – one of many stories in the fairy folklore – was viewed as a cautionary tale on motherhood and madness. Dolan reinterpreted this in the modern context of psychiatric illness and the trauma that accompanies the illness through the generations.
In Irish culture, families avoid mentioning the more concrete issues of depression and anxiety and instead talk about the more nebulous “possession”. Dolan’s film navigates between the science and the folklore, the therapy and the exorcism.
The same fascination was seen in India, which shares the same cultural and local folklore traditions. A spirit taking over a loved one is a common theme and stories like chudails and nagin revolve around this deep psychological fear and possession. For many Indian audience, Dolan’s film was a cathartic experience. They identified with Char and her helplessness, the agony of watching a loved one transform and the terror of the coinciding the paranormal.
Hazel Doupe’s Quiet Power
Hazel Doupe is at the center of it all, whose portrayal of Char anchors the chaos. She started acting at a young age, notably in Float Like a Butterfly, where Doupe portrayed the character with both innocence and defiance. For her subtle reactions of the character, reviewers made comparisons to legendary silent performances in horror, such as Pugh in Midsommar and Sissy Spacek in Carrie, citing the trembling lip and the quiet watchfulness as signature features.
In her interviews, Doupe talked about the role being emotionally exhausting. There were days, she explained, when I’d go home and still feel like I was waiting for my own mother to come back from somewhere dark. Shot in late autumn in Ireland, the film was reportedly as cold and isolating as the film itself.
Following You Are Not My Mother, fans observed that Doupe started getting offers for darker independent films and roles that dealt with loss, self-identity, and personal transformation. “I think people started seeing me as someone who could hold silence,” she stated with laughter during an interview. “But that silence came from fear.”
While Doupe inspired empathy, Carolyn Bracken inspired fear. Fans called Bracken “the Irish Babadook” due to the unnerving quality of her transformation from weary mother to something unrecognizable. As Bracken has said, she created her character Angela based on her interpretation of postpartum depression. “There’s a moment when you look at your child and don’t know who you are anymore,” she said. “That’s the scariest feeling — not ghosts.”
Dolan directed Bracken to study the subconscious, animalistic behavior of horses and dogs in order to portray the changeling and the unnatural presence she had. The infamous dinner scene had no CGI. Bracken actually held that smile for nearly 20 seconds while the camera rolled, her jaw trembling by the end.
Theories That Took a Life of Their Own
Fan discussions erupted soon after its launch. While some argued that the entire film was a psychological narrative — that Angela never disappeared but rather had a breakdown, and Char’s supernatural perceptions were a child’s trauma response — other fans leaned toward folklore: Angela was replaced by a changeling, and the grandmother’s ritual at the film’s end was a way to restore balance.
The “cycle theory” was perhaps the most debated. Other Reddit threads focused on the film’s final shot, were Char looks in the mirror and momentarily hesitates before smiling. The ambiguous shot could suggest she’s inherited the curse, leading to the terrifying conclusion of the film.
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