Goodnight Mommy takeaway: How does the film comment on unchecked mental health of children? (Spoilers)

Goodnight Mommy is a suspense/thriller/horror film that premiered on Amazon Prime Video on Friday, September 16, 2022. It is an American remake of the 2014 Austrian film of the same name, and follows twin brothers Elias and Lukas, who visit their mother and find her with a bandaged face.

Amazon Prime Video’s synopsis of Goodnight Mommy reads:

"Twin brothers arrive at their Mother’s country home to discover her face covered in bandages—the result, she explains, of recent cosmetic surgery. As her behavior grows increasingly erratic and unusual, however, a horrifying thought takes root in the boys’ minds: the sinking suspicion that the woman beneath the gauze isn’t their mother at all.

Naomi Watts plays the mother with her suspiciously covered face, while real-life twins Cameron and Nicholas Crovetti essay the on-screen pair of twins.

Watts’ bandaged face is a good distraction from the real theme that the film deals with. However, the ghost in Goodnight Mommy is not the physical manifestation of an extra-terrestrial being but is the ghost of one’s past. Here, Elias’ past haunts him and he is reluctant to let go of it because he does not want to be alone.

Read on to find out what happened in Goodnight Mommy, which is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video.

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How does Goodnight Mommy comment on children's mental health if left unchecked?

Brief overview of the plot

Goodnight Mommy began with Elias and Lukas arriving at their mother's place for what looked like summer. The twins were greeted with a mother whose face was covered, and attributed to cosmetic surgery. While neither took it up further, Elias was suspicious from the beginning.

After several instances of rash behavior from their mother, escalating to violence in a few, Lukas concluded that the woman they were staying with was their mother's imposter and not their real mother.

Thus began their quest to find out the truth, which became subject to change after a plot twist revealed that Elias hallucinated Lukas, who had died the previous year. Elias accidentally shot Lukas in the barn behind their mother's house while playing.

Elias was unable to come to terms with the reality that Lukas did not exist, and in a fit of momentary rage pushed his mother to death. The film ended with Elias now hallucinating about both Lukas and his mother.

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How does Goodnight Mommy comment on unchecked mental health?

It begins with the mother, played by Watts, being aware of Elias' hallucinations about Lukas. In a scene where Elias eavesdropped on a conversation between his mother and an undisclosed person, the mother is heard saying,

"That's the problem. He's never apart from Lukas."

A still from the film (Image via IMDb)

She adds that she doesn't think she can stay "another second" in the house before claiming that she needs to put an end to it and that she needs him to go. Watts even goes on to ask how long she needs to keep pretending.

The mother also alluded to the barn, which is where Lukas had lost his life the previous winter. Even though she had asked Elias not to go back there, he sneaked in only to be caught later.

Even then, the topic of Lukas' death went unaddressed. The film's efforts to create mystery around a child's mental health puts the spotlight on the ramifications of such unchecked situations.

Hallunications emerge from untapped trauma that gets deep-seated into an individual's subconscious. Elias, in Goodnight Mommy, is reluctant to come to terms with the reality of Lukas' death. As his mother rightly put it in one of the scenes,

"That line between reality and fantasy has vanished."

Elias seems to be trapped in a make-believe world where the reins are shifted to Lukas' hands. It is because of this that when the mother attempted to make Elias face reality in the barn, he not only broke down but pushed his mother to death out of momentary rage.

Even after watching the barn burn with his mother in it, Elias' subconscious prioritizes the hallucinatory images of Lukas and his mother that appeared before him right after he ran out of the barn.

Instead of questioning reality, Elias found comfort in hugging his imaginary mother and brother.

While Goodnight Mommy failed to address the issue at hand with clarity, it refers to a condition known as dissociative identity disorder that Elias seems to suffer from.

Elias' unchecked mental health could stem from his parents employing their own defense mechanisms to deal with the death of one of their children. The cosmetic surgery, which the mother says is for a fresh start, is just one example of this. Other than that, in a scene where Elias speaks up about the suspicion that the woman is an imposter, she says:

"I haven't been myself, but I will be better."

Even though the need to seek help is insistent, it turns up as a momentary discussion between Elias and the female police officer.

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Goodnight Mommy is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video.