One of the things I’ve learned from having children is how little I’d understood about the experience before. There isn’t much I’d say someone is unentitled to comment on without having undertaken, but this? Definitely. It has been both the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done, and the hardest. Take the range of emotions you’ve felt, good and bad, and imagine them at double the intensity, then you’ll have a distant idea of what it’s like.

And it’s the emotions no parent talks about that The Babadook zeroes in on. This film peels back and lays naked the sheer endurance test awaiting parents when something goes wrong. It’s nightmare fuel for millennials (who often view children primarily in terms of subtraction) and experienced parents (who know all about the fickle hand of chance). Read the rest of this entry →