GOOD MADAM (REVIEW)

Dir. Jenna Cato Bass

Reviewer. Martyn Wakefield

GOOD MADAM, from director Jenna Cato Bass and is a stark blend of indie cinema and cultural empowerment that brings with it an education and a feverish nightmare for western audiences.

While working as a live-in carer for Madam, Tsidi (Chumisa Cosa) and her daughter uncover an unnatural and sinister following for the woman they feel they owe their lives to.

Cosa gives an award winning performance as a mother trying to survive but also understand and rationalize the madness around her. Unfortunately, despite GOOD MADAM's sincere and very real messaging, it will not avoid comparison to Jordan Peele's GET OUT and offers little new however it feels just as important to handle and keep the light burning in race relations still very relative today.

What Jenna Cato Bass brings is a magnified lens on South African cinema, a region very rarely recognized in the horror community and she handles it meticulously. Flashes of indie classics, and stylized title cards bring back memories of Roman Polamski's cult baring classic while Tsidi's nightmares and frantic need to escape really hone in in a desperate mother who is alienated in her own world, something close to the horrors of INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS.

A powerful and forgettable horror debut that is only shadowed by similar themes and messages already told on a larger scale of film but GOOD MADAM is no lesser for it. ROSEMARY'S BABY meets GET OUT gives us nightmares we won't be forgetting for a while.