After humanity is wiped out, an android grows an embryo into a baby in a remote research facility. Over the years, the robot named “Mother” (original voice: Rose Byrne) has taken care of the “daughter” (Clara Rugaard), who has now grown into a teenager. But then suddenly an injured woman (Hilary Swank) shows up at the door of the hermetically sealed facility…
So begins I Am Mother, the feature debut by Australian director Grant Sputore. If the film’s plot outlined above piques your curiosity and you want to know what’s really behind the events of the sci-fi mystery, you’re in luck: “I Am Mother” is available on Amazon Freevee since July 22, 2023 – free and without a subscription!
In addition to the well-known Prime Video streaming service, Amazon has had a second streaming service for some time now, but unlike Prime Video, you don’t even need a subscription for that: with Freevee you can watch movies and series just like that, directly via the browser or via the Prime Video app on smart TVs and mobile devices. The only downside: there are commercial breaks.
However, in the case of “I Am Mother,” it’s worth putting up with these commercial breaks, because expect nothing less than one of the best and brightest sci-fi films of recent years. The editors of FILMSTARTS also gave it a strong 4 out of 5 stars:
In his review, FILMSTARTS editor-in-chief Christoph Petersen praised the film as a “greatly acted, repeatedly surprising, consistently ambivalent and thematically rich room game for two people and a robot in the tradition of such cleverly concentrated sci-fi pieces as ‘Moon’ or ‘Ex Machina’, consistently ambivalent and with twists and turns, getting to the heart of the matter.”
Not only does “I Am Mother” offer beautifully cool sci-fi visuals and fantastic robot design, there is already a disturbing visual ambivalence, which is picked up again and again in terms of theme and content and runs like a thread through the film until the shocking end. Director Grant Sputore continues to challenge his audience and keeps the tension high at all times.
There is also a lot of praise in FILMSTARTS criticism for the then 21-year-old Danish actress Clara Rugaard, who celebrated her international breakthrough with “I Am Mother” and recently appeared in an episode of the Netflix dystopian series “Black Mirror”.