Umma (PG-13)
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This film has a supernatural element, so I was pretty torn about whether to put my review under "supernatural horror" or "psychological horror". I literally went back and forth, at first planning on "psychological", then actually starting to set up the review page in my "supernatural" section", before going back to my original plan. I don't really want to downplay the supernatural element, because I thought it was effective enough at conveying the fear of characters in the movie, if not so much scaring viewers. But I really think the psychological angle is a much more important part of the story. The movie did rather poorly with critics, but I thought it was pretty good, even if it's not quite good enough for me to consider it super memorable. I can understand critics being underwhelmed, but I still thought it was better than most of them did.

A Korean-American woman named Amanda (Sandra Oh) lives on an isolated farm, raising bees for honey with her 16-year-old daughter, Chrissy. They have no electricity, because Amanda is supposedly allergic to it, or something. Actually, she just stopped using electricity after Chrissy was born, because of how her own mother (or "umma" in Korean) used to abuse her. One day, Amanda's uncle tracks her down to tell her that her mother has died, and to deliver her ashes and a few possessions to Amanda. She doesn't tell Chrissy about this at first, because she just wants to forget about her mother. But she's haunted by terrifying visions of her late mother. (Actually, the first vision came before her uncle's visit.) Meanwhile, Chrissy has been thinking of applying to college, and Amanda fears losing her, just as her own mother had lost Amanda when she ran away, years ago.

For awhile, I wasn't even quite sure whether Amanda was really being haunted, or if it was all in her head. Eventually it does become clear that the haunting is real. But the main concern is that she might, in a sense, turn into her mother, in the way she treats Chrissy. And... I'm not sure what else to say. I guess I should mention that Amanda and Chrissy have a friend named Danny, whose niece, River, befriends Chrissy. Other than that, I really don't want to spoil too many details of the plot. But I do think that despite the movie being supernatural, the greater horror comes in the form of Amanda's mental state, and her need to let go of the past, as well as accepting that Chrissy can't stay with her forever (but that doesn't means she'll lose her). Anyway... I just felt like the movie works well, on a psychological level.