Critic Reviews

In the end, Mother/Android is a dramatic triumph that uses cosmic horror alchemy to get some serious expressionism across. It is well worth the trip into the dark woods.

It’s a bizarre movie, but there’s enough action to help you zip through this overstuffed story even if you’re not sure why you (or Georgia, or Sam) are there in the first place.

Mother/Android isn't the sci-fi movie you think it's going to be, or even the movie it probably wants to be, but it's nonetheless a solid first-time feature from from writer/director Mattson Tomlin.

Like its confusing title, Mother/Android never really figures out what it wants to say.

While it gets mileage out of its two fine lead performances and the story has deep emotional roots for the filmmakers, its journey fails to capture the imagination.

Tomlin’s screenplay deserves credit for mixing things up, introducing new characters and narrative turnabouts. But nothing is again as bluntly compelling as the early going, and despite hardworking principal performances, these characters and their movie lack the emotional depth to pull off an earnestly teary, draggy finale.

With Moretz here to ensure it’s at least a story we invest in, bringing emotional heft to the moments that beg for it, this nothing-special dystopia manages the bare minimum that fans should expect from films of this genre.

While the storytelling of “Mother/Android” leaves a lot to be desired, Tomlin does prove himself to be an efficient stylist across multiple scenes throughout this journey.

A forgettable post-apocalyptic pastiche that borrows liberally from “The Terminator,” “The Last of Us,” and “A Quiet Place” without building upon those influences with any new ideas of its own, Mattson Tomlin’s Mother/Android is the sort of mediocre streaming fare that might appease genre fans for 100 minutes or so, but will almost certainly leave them pining for the days when original sci-fi movies demanded (or at least encouraged) a modicum of originality.

There is some panache to the film’s visuals and a lot of heart in the actors’ collective dedication, but “Mother/Android” feels like a bland mash-up of genre staples to forgettable effect.