Cradle Will Fall

From Medea to tabloid headlines, stories of mothers who murder their children have always fascinated and revolted us. Cradle Will Fall, supposedly based on real events, features a young mum suffering from post-natal depression in an isolated farming community, who one night snaps and decides to kill her children. It’s an original horror premise served well by slick production values and unusually decent child actors. Violence against children is one of the last big horror taboos, but once the initial shock is out the way, the underwritten script struggles to find interesting ways to frame standard stalker chases and resorts to familiar horror clichés. In spite of the dark subject matter, there is not much in the way of genuine tension or scares and in the end it could be almost any other slasher. For genre fans looking for something a little different this is a perfectly good timewaster, but it’s sad to see what could have been a serious attempt to break new ground settle for merely routine.