Losing any loved one that be a harrowing experience, but there is something about a parent outliving their child that is particularly devastating. Some have even said that it is nearly impossible to ever fully recover from such a tragedy, with the grief being a burden that a parent carries for their entire life. Barbara Abel understood this to be quite a common occurrence and one that was worth exploring in detail, since her novel Derrière la haine (“Behind the Hate”) tackles this exact subject, and has been adapted into films on two separate occasions, the most recent of which is the subject of the present discussion. Mothers’ Instinct, which was helmed by Benoît Delhomme in his directorial debut after over 40 years as a cinematographer, is a peculiar and challenging film, and quite an effective adaptation of the source material, which looks at the relationship between two mild-mannered housewives living somewhere in suburban America in the early 1960s, whose previously ironclad friendship is shaken when a tragedy strikes and one of their sons is killed after a horrifying accident. Suddenly, the two women are plunged into a state of despair in which they go from the best of friends to the most brutal of enemies, particularly due to the swirling emotions of guilt, paranoia and anger that stir within both of them and lead them to begin to act erratically, sometimes without reason. A fascinating character study that doesn’t always reach its full potential, but still carries immense significance in terms of both its subject matter and the execution of its ideas, Mothers’ Instinct is quite an interesting film, even if some of the clear shortcomings prove to be slightly less polished, particularly for someone who has been involved in the industry for decades, and hs only now decided to step behind the camera as a director for the first time, a bold and ostentatious debut that proves to be far more captivating than we’d imagine at the outset.

From the start, most of what drives us to voyage into the world of Mothers’ Instinct is the promise of seeing two exceptional actors at the absolute peak of their craft, acting across from each other and proving to be able to play quite diverse roles. Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain lead this film and prove to be turning in some exceptional work that stands as some of their very best, precisely because they’re taking on two very complex characters that would give nearly any actor the chance to prove themselves. While both have been at the forefront of a lot of contemporary cinema, it’s not unreasonable to suggest that they often turn in their most interesting work when playing women from different eras. At first, they may seem to be performing at slightly different registers – Hathaway perfectly fits into the world of 1960s Americana, whereas Chastain struggles initially, but eventually finds her stride after the climactic moments that lead to the central conflict, which proves that Chastain has always been more adept at playing characters defined by a sense of urgency and despair, rather than luxuriating in the splendour of playing the more superficial aspects of the character. Of the two, it is Hathaway that is most surprising – and between Mothers’ Instinct and last year’s Eileen, she has carved a solid niche as a chic, urbane woman whose glamour and beaming smile conceal something more terrifying, her psychopathic behaviour being well-hidden under layers of haute couture and the most seemingly gentle, congenial disposition. Hathaway and Chastain are very different actors, and they approach these roles from intentionally different perspectives, which makes the story, which is built on their shifting relationship before and after a harrowing tragedy, all the more complex. The leads are wonderful, as are Anders Danielsen Lie and Josh Charles as their husbands, who turn in memorable supporting performances that are charismatic and tinged with a sense of patriarchal anger that begins to fester, giving the film a sense of rage and urgency, and allowing is to truly connect with the two protagonists on a deeper level.

There aren’t many themes in art more resonant and widely explored than that of motherhood, which is precisely the foundation on which Mothers’ Instinct is built, clearly indicated by the title that suggests that most of the story would be filtered through the lens of exploring the relationship between parents and their children, as well as the perspective of two very different mothers who considered themselves kindred spirits, but prove that they were not truly there for each other in the way that the perhaps thought they would be after an accident causes the loss of one of their sons. This is not an easy film to watch, particularly because of how it addresses some themes that are not taboo in the traditional sense but are still viewed as far too harrowing to be entirely acceptable as a form of artistic expression. Mothers’ Instinct walks a very narrow tightrope between being provocative and exploitative, and for almost the entire duration of the film, we find the story trying to find ways to explore the secondary (but still very important) themes of grief and trauma, two related experiences that many of us will feel at some point, but yet never expect to see them emerge quite so soon in many cases, since it always feels like a loved one is departing prematurely, especially when they meet their fate as a result of a tragic accident. These themes come together to form a film that is a fascinating account of the lives of these two women as they navigate the harrowing changes that they have been forced to endure in the aftermath of an unspeakable tragedy, one so enormous that it can turn someone previously law-abiding and decent into a brutal, psychopathic killer, the transition between the two is jarring but very much understandable in the context of what is being explored, which are several complex themes that are resonant in a way that hopefully none of us can ever attest to having firsthand experience, particularly considering the unbearable weight of what these characters have to endure throughout a film that directly addresses the sometimes unwieldy trauma that can come about when losing someone prematurely.

Mothers’ Instinct may centre primarily on one of the most unspeakable experiences anyone could ever endure, but this is only one theme that we find at the heart of the film, which is best described as defining David Lynch’s often-quoted statement of “I discovered that if one looks a little closer at this beautiful world, there are always red ants underneath”, which is often referenced whenever the concept of suburban life comes about in a conversation. From the first haunting moments of the film, it is clear that it is taking place in a community where secrets abound and guide the daily lives of these people, even if only by forcing them to go even further to conceal the more sinister aspects of their routine or the darker corners of their mind that sometimes emerge at unexpected intervals, and become definitive of their personality in the aftermath of a tragedy. One of the great fallacies of the past few centuries has been the construction of the idealistic, Rockwell-esque version of the American Dream, where a white picket fence and a loving nuclear family are viewed as aspirational, when we realize that such a concept is merely theoretical, and can never actually exist, at least not in the perfect, polished form that the media made out to be possible as a way of peddling their capitalistic ventures. Mothers’ Instinct is a film about the broken promises of suburbia, and moving the story from Europe, where it was originally set, and instead situating it within a relatively ordinary middle-class suburban community in some ambigious part of the United States forces us to interpret this story as being equally about the burden of losing a child as it is focused on dismantling the idea of the ideal wife and mother, and how this figure represents a dark chapter in American history, one in which women were forced into a position of subservience, so much that they lose their agency and come to be viewed as mere features of a social system that simply didn’t manifest in the way it was intended. There are many intriguing layers to Mothers’ Instinct, which is a far more nuanced and compelling film as a result of its slightly more off-kilter approach to exploring the themes surrounding the perfect family and the fact that it quite simply does not exist in the way we imagined.

Far from an easy film to discuss, purely because of the sheer number of layers that exist in this story, Mothers’ Instinct is a haunting film that touches on themes that are potentially controversial and genuinely quite unsettling, particularly in how they explore the aftermath of a tragic incident that not only causes the premature death of a child, but unleashes a months-long feud between two former best friends who find that their connection was based less on common ground or the fondness for each other’s company, and more for the sheer reason that they existed nearby, which is often seen as the default criterion for friendship, but which can have severe consequences if it is abused too much. Mothers’ Instinct is not a perfect film – some of the stories meanders to the point where we begin to lose interest, and some of the events are far too convenient to be entirely effective. Yet, purely as a piece of diverting entertainment, the film is a worthwhile way to spend our time. It is an economical and reasonable 94 minutes in length, and it moves at a breakneck pace, telling a shocking and unsettling story about parental grief, and how such an event can turn even the most well-adjusted and logical people into shells of their former selves, and where no amount of comfort or therapy will allow them to ever recover from this immense loss. Mothers’ Instinct is a fascinating film, one that has its shortcomings, but which mostly exists as a solid, reliably psychological thriller that is not afraid to be dark, a film that knows how to capture our attention and maintain it for this delightfully perverse and oddly revealing character study that peers beneath the layers of suburbia and emerges as one of the most profoundly disturbing and hauntingly complex psychological thrillers of the year.