Unlike a few of the movies on this list, figuring out The Babadook isn't that difficult—provided you keep up with the sudden change in perspective in the final act. For much of its running time, this indie horror hit looks and feels like a particularly satisfying supernatural home invasion picture, with the titular nasty creature tormenting a single mother (Essie Davis) and her six-year-old son (Noah Wiseman) after he's inadvertently summoned through the reading of a disturbing children's book. But there's more going on beneath the surface. In the film's closing scenes, after the Babadook has possessed Davis' character and she tries to strangle her son, he draws it out of her with a tender expression of love—at which point the Babadook flees into the basement, where she's stored all mementos of her husband since his death.
That's when we realize the creature wasn't supernatural at all—it was her years of repressed grief, which had grown so powerful it threatened to destroy the lives of everything it touched. In a perfect blend of heartwarming and gross, The Babadook's closing moments show mother and son gathering a bowl of worms, which Davis takes into the basement to feed the vanquished beast—tacitly acknowledging that she'll always carry it with her, and honor its place in her heart.
From Looper.com
The Babadook Ending: What Is Mister Babadook?
BY ERIC EISENBERG
We've seen the release of many fantastic and frightening horror films in the last few years, but there is an argument to be made that none could be called better than writer/director Jennifer Kent's The Babadook. Made for just $2 million, the Australian movie is the rather simple story of an exhausted mother, an out-of-control child, and incredibly disturbing pop-up book -- but it comes together as an exercise in pure terror that effectively gets movie-goers to curl into the fetal position in their chairs.
In addition to being scary as all hell, The Babadook is also a smart film that doesn't feel the need to explain everything and talk down to its audience -- but that does leave the ending up to some interpretation. Specifically, what is Mister Babadook, and why won't he leave Amelia and Sam alone? Below and on the next couple of pages we dive into this subject in depth, so read on and learn more about this magnificent horror movie!
SPOILER WARNING: The following feature contains massive spoilers for The Babadook. If you have not yet seen the film, and don't wish to know details about the way the movie ends, you may want to click away to another one of our wonderful articles.
What Happens At The End Of The Film
It's a bit hard to pinpoint an exact place to call the beginning of the end in The Babadook, given that the end of the second act is as chaotic and insane as great cinema gets -- so we'll just start after the young Sam (Noah Wiseman) has managed to knock out his mother, Amelia (Essie Davis), and tie her to the floor in the basement. Still clearly under the influence of Mister Babadook, she wakes up and immediately assaults her child, attempting to choke him and kill him. Doing anything he can to try and stop her, knowing she loves him very much, Sam reaches out with his hand and begins to stroke his mom's cheek, which works successfully.
Amelia releases her hands from around her son's throat, has a nice solid freak out, turns over, and vomits a long spew of black liquid. While it seems for a moment that Amelia might be gone, she wakes after being stirred by Sam. As they go back upstairs, the atmosphere becomes peaceful once again, and it looks as though the mother and son are finally free to return to their lives, with the evil monster that has been plaguing them finally gone. Unfortunately, it's at this point that Sam reminds Amelia of one of the pop-up book's most memorable lines: "You can't get rid of the Babadook!" Sam falls backwards and is quickly pulled up the stairs by an invisible force, dragged into his mother's bedroom.
When Amelia catches up with Sam, she watches as he is violently thrown against the wall multiple times -- leading her to grab him and take him to the bed. Staring into the darkness of her room in which Mister Babadook loves to appear, she screams asking what the haunting figure wants. From out of the shadows we see Amelia's dead husband, Oskar (Benjamin Winspear), who repeats the words he said just before the car crash that killed him -- and she watches as his head is sliced in half. It's the visage that finally pushes the grieving mother over the edge, and she begins to howl at the torturous presence: "This is my house! You are trespassing in my house! If you touch my son again I'll fucking kill you!"
Though it seems like the house is going to fall apart for a moment, the chaos abates, and Mister Babadook's seemingly empty suit and top hat fall to the floor. As Amelia approaches it and reaches out, it once again stands to full height, screams in Amelia's face, and speedily bolts down to the basement, where Amelia locks it in.
The next scene picks up sometime later, as Sam celebrates his birthday at home... with the presence of the two social services workers checking in. Both Amelia and Sam seem much happier than they were, and Sam is incredibly excited to actually be having a party on his actual birthday. While this is perceived as odd, Amelia explains the situation, and says that her husband died on the day of Sam's birth -- following up by noting that her son very much takes after the departed Oskar.
Once the social workers have left, Amelia goes into the backyard and begins digging up worms and putting them in a bowl with Sam's help. Together, they then go to the basement door, where Sam asks if he'll be able to see it -- and his mom explains that he will someday, when he's bigger. Going downstairs, she puts the bowl of worms on the ground -- as is scared to have Mister Babadook charge at her, blowing her back. This winds up being just one intense moment, however, and after calming words from Amelia, the monster eventually retreats, taking the worms with him. Having successfully fed the beast, the proud mother goes back upstairs to have sandwiches with her son, and watch him perform an amazing magic trick. Finally happy, she hugs Sam and smiles as the credits begin to roll.
But what does this all mean? Who is Mister Babadook? Go on to the next page for our explanation!
What Is Mister Babadook?
As anyone who has suffered a debilitating, scarring loss can attest, there is no way to erase that kind of emotional pain. There is no drug that can cure it, and there is no amount of time that will permanently relegate it to the past. Instead, it becomes a part of your life and something that you have to live with -- as when destruction is impossible, the only answer is management. Understanding this is key to deciphering the end of The Babadook, because what you ultimately discover about the titular monster is that he's not your traditional kind of monster. Instead, he's a physical manifestation of the extreme grief that Amelia has been living with since the day her husband died.
The first and most important clue to this conclusion is something that may come as a surprise to those of you who are still putting all of the movie's puzzle pieces together: the author of The Babadook book is Amelia herself. This is something that's never explicitly put together within the film, but there is plenty of evidence to support it as fact. This includes the conversation Amelia has while talking with the other mothers at her niece's birthday (where it's revealed that she's a writer who dabbled in "kid's stuff"), but also the charcoal on her hands when she is at the police station. In the moment you might take away that this was a result of the book BBQ -- but it's far more likely it came as a result of writing the additional pages that are in the new copy of Mister Babadook that appears on her doorstep post-shredding. The explanation for why we don't actually see any of this on screen can be explained by the fact that The Babadook is exclusively told from Amelia's perspective, and her hyper-emotional state makes her an unreliable narrator.
While the identity of the author of the book is the more subtle clue regarding the identity of Mister Babadook, the more substantial validation is the relationship between Amelia and Sam in relation to Amelia's dead husband, and the structure of Amelia's arc in the movie. It's bad enough that Sam is insanely clingy, has no brain/mouth filter, and is both obsessed with and terrified by monsters, but he also happens to be a living breathing reminder of his mother's loss, being born on the same day that Oskar was killed in a car crash. This day winds up driving all of the events in the film going forward, as Amelia's narrative closely resembles the Five Stages of Grief. Her loss leads her to ignore reality (isolating her to a life with just her son), lash out in anger, lose hope, and even bargain with the Babadook for the life of her child.
In the end, it's thankfully recognized that infanticide is never the answer, and final scenes of The Babadook provide all of the finishing clues needed to recognize exactly what kind of monster the Babadook is. Not only does the conclusion finally feature Amelia standing up to her demon and staring it down (a.k.a. acceptance), but the epilogue demonstrates how much her life has improved now that she has learned to manage her deep inner pain. She herself can recognize the spirit of Oskar in Sam, and has even reached a point where she is fine with her son celebrating his birthday on his actual day of birth. It's not all peaches and cream, as the emotional nature of the day does make her feel the need to literally feed the monster that is dwelling deep within her house -- but Mister Babadook a.k.a. Amelia's intense grief is under control and her relationship with Samuel improves, and that's really what matters.
From CinemaBlend
What Does The Ending Of The Babadook Really Mean?
By Jesse Gumbarge
If you’ve just finished watching the psychological horror film The Babadook, then you may find yourself having a few unanswered questions. Was there really a creature at all? What exactly happened? And worst of all, what was up with those worms at the end? Well, let’s try to work through this together shall we? It should go without saying, giving the title of the article, but a SPOILER ALERT is in full effect!
Leading up to the anniversary of her husband’s death, the depressed and emotional Amelia (played by Essie Davis) begins to sense a disturbing presence stalking her and her son Samuel (played by Noah Wiseman) after reading a mysterious pop-up children’s storybook titled “Mister Babadook.”
What’s immediately striking about this film is its persistence on ambiguity. As a horror film it comes across as a very frightening lullaby. On the other hand, the film will most likely not sit well with many fans of the genre because of its departure from traditional dramatic scares and generic imagery. Instead The Babadook treats horror with far more intelligence as it really challenges your emotional output more constructively than films that are similar.
The Babadook “creature” itself takes up less than a few minutes of screen time as director Jennifer Kent focuses on implication rather than the obvious. What’s really effective is how conspicuous the cinematography is; as each shot of the creature is composed with immense subtlety. Its appearance plays on our misinterpretation of darkness. We’ve all been in that situation where we woke up in the middle of the night and thought we saw a strange man lurking in the corner only to discover that it’s only a coat or some random object. Metaphorically, the film is shot with this fact in mind.
As you watch the film you’ll quickly notice that the composition of each character and object is always on the verge of your peripheral vision rather than being directly in your field of view. You’ll think you saw something out of the corner of your eye and before you know it, the film has already cut to the next shot.
Despite there being no loud bangs or jump scares the film still manages to make you tense up simply at the sight of a mere claw in the darkness. Because the film plays on psychology you’re left questioning whether or not the monster is actually a fragment of Amelia’s fears and detachment because of her copious amounts of stress.
Like The Exorcist or The Shining, The Babadook is far more of a human story rather than simply setting up scare after scare. There is an inherent skepticism that needs to be maintained in order to manipulate the audience’s sense of understanding. By giving doubt, you’re also creating a fear of uncertainty; a natural human emotion that makes characters so relatable.
Now, on the face of it, this film may seem like a typical possession movie (even the Kickstarter campaign for the film descried it as such). Though, there is a strong case to be made that the events of the film are simply a representation of Amelia’s sorrow. The film is seemingly about grief and resentment that consumed both her and her son. Sam grew up without a father, he lives with a mother who keeps a locked basement with all his possessions. She clearly has at least some resentment built up towards her son as she finds him partly guilty for causing the father’s death. The kid feels that resentment and sees it constantly from his mother who has visibly gone off the deep end. The metaphoric shit starts hitting the fan when the boy goes into the basement, “releasing the demon” aka bringing stirring up strong memories for his mother.
This happens in cycles every year, hence Sam never having had a real birthday party. The boy feels like he caused everything and his mom reinforces this idea. This causes him to act out at school and also causes him great anxiety. The neighbor next door even says, “I know how hard this time of year can be for you..”
This is a reoccurring theme in both of their lives. They “protect each other” from it. He from her demons and her from his. The boy being tossed around was the mother’s doing. We learn that she sometime’s has out of body experiences (i.e. when she finds herself hovering over Sam with a knife out of nowhere). We as the audience see the boy being thrown around by nothing, but it is indeed the mother. The “possession” was simply the built up of memories/depression/resentment etc.
The Babadook manifesting itself as a top hat-wearing monster? Well, young Sam is obsessed with magic, and magicians tend to dress in that fashion, maybe that has something to do with it. As far as the book? It is stated in the film that Amelia indeed used to write children’s books and when she goes to the police station her hands are black. This isn’t from her burning the book but rather it is most likely from using pastels to create the book herself. Her keeping it in the basement is just her keeping it out of site/out of mind (or perhaps she finally faces her fears and is able to move on). Feeding it worms can mean whatever you want it to mean. Though, the bottom line is that this is not a movie about a demonic possession in the typical sense.
The Babadook isn’t groundbreaking filmmaking but it’s an affirmation in horror that was truly needed. There’s a corky oddity you need to overcome in order to get on the same page as the film. Though, once you do, it’ll keep you thinking and it will certainly keep you scared. There is indeed a persistent chill of how daring The Babadook was to subvert your attention to the unknown rather than the unremarkable.
