Jessica Chastain plays both mother and monster in a disturbing new Halloween horror.
- Jessica Chastain takes two unsettling roles in Other Mommy.
- A young girl faces a sinister presence inside home.
- James Wan and Rob Savage team up for chilling horror.
- The supernatural thriller reaches regional cinemas this October.
Halloween horror works best when it makes something familiar feel strangely wrong. A quiet house, a familiar voice, a parent’s face. Other Mommy takes that discomfort and pushes it further, placing a young girl named Bela at the centre of a terrifying encounter with an entity that looks uncannily like her mother. UAE audiences can experience the horror in cinemas from October 8.
A child’s bedroom can feel like the safest place in the house, especially after dark. Bela’s world takes a darker turn when a sinister presence appears at home and begins taking the form of the person she trusts most. Nothing feels normal.
Jessica Chastain makes that premise even more unsettling by taking on both sides of the nightmare. The Academy Award winner plays Bela’s mother as well as “Other Mommy”, the supernatural manifestation that adopts her appearance. That dual performance sits at the centre of the film’s tension, because the face Bela recognises is also the one she has reason to fear.
The horror comes from familiarity. A smile can feel wrong. A voice can sound almost right. For viewers heading to the cinema during Dubai’s Halloween season, that makes Other Mommy a very different kind of scare from a creature simply appearing out of nowhere.
Behind the camera, the film brings together some familiar names from modern horror. James Wan, known for the Saw, Insidious and Conjuring franchises, produces alongside Blumhouse Atomic Monster, while Rob Savage directs following genre films including Host and The Boogeyman. Nathan Elston wrote the screenplay.
The source material adds another layer. Other Mommy is based on Josh Malerman’s New York Times bestselling novel Incidents Around the House, the author also known for Bird Box. The story keeps its focus close to Bela and the strange presence inside her home.
Around her, the cast includes Jay Duplass as Daddo, Bela’s father, and Arabella Olivia Clark as Bela. Dichen Lachman, Arian Moayed and Karen Allen also join the ensemble, giving the family horror a broader cast beyond its central mother and daughter dynamic.
For UAE horror fans, the timing is almost too perfect. October brings the annual appetite for darker cinema, and Other Mommy arrives with a premise built around one deeply uncomfortable question: what happens if the person you trust most suddenly isn’t who they appear to be?
Some fears feel familiar. Catch Other Mommy in regional cinemas from October 8 and make it part of your Halloween movie plans!
