The Mother is not as misogynstic as a lot of Hanif Kureshi’s work, but it still has some pretty horrible women in the centre of it. On paper this is a potentially laudable taboo busting film about sex between an older woman and younger man. It is actually one of the ultimate yuppie nightmare movies. Your mum, old fuddy duddy that she is, starts shagging your boyfriend. Ugh.
It is as a disconcerting horror movie that the Mother works best. Unfortunately all the hard work done by the first half of the film making Daniel Craig a loveable loser is thrown away in the second half making the other man merely a mercenary pathetic creature. This brings the mother daughter relationship closer, and dissipates the wonderful tension that had been built up. The scene when Craig goes nuts destroy all the hard work the rest of the film done in a peak of improv acting nonsense. Its a pity, since Craig and Anne Reid as the titular mother had built up an unlikely but real feeling relationship. By complicating the plot, Kureshi unfortunately allows the characters a get out from an otherwise intractable situation.
Oh, and it is set in West London, and I hate films set in West London.