Mommy's Day Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		1.5
Video		1.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		1.5

Mommy's Day Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman December 26, 2019

Note: This film is available as part of Mommy & Mommy's Day.

Patty McCormack will most likely always be in the annals of Academy Award history (or at least trivia) by being one of the youngest nominees in Oscar history, a nomination for Best Supporting Actress which she secured when she was just a bit over eleven years old, for her work as murderous Rhoda Penmark in The Bad Seed. McCormack’s portrayal of the nefarious Rhoda was so disturbing that the film version not only had to change the ending of the original play, but also have a kind of cheeky (pun intended) coda with Rhoda getting pretend spanked during the closing credits. Alas, there’s no one around to spank a grown up McCormack as the titular character in Mommy and its follow up, Mommy’s Day.

While hardly in the same league in terms of either its source film or in fact as a sequel, Mommy’s Day shares something in common with Psycho II: namely, a psychopathic killer (in this case Mrs. Sterling, as portrayed by Patty McCormack) is set free (more or less, anyway), and a new round of killings starts up, with the viewer left to wonder whether the killer from the first film is up to his or her old tricks or whether some new murderer is wreaking havoc. There’s arguably a bit more suspense in Mommy’s Day than there was in Mommy, but the film is still hardly a fright fest, and in fact seems to be aiming more for black humor at least some of the time.

Mommy's Day Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Mommy's Day is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of VCI and MVD Visual with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. This sequel like its progenitor on this disc seems to have been sourced from an element that had some kind of video interstitial somewhere along the production chain, and in fact this transfer bears even more of a video-esque appearance than the first film, with a pretty ragged and digitally tweaked look that includes the same kind of stair stepping I mentioned in our Mommy Blu-ray review along with some pretty bad edge enhancement (see screenshot 5 for just one example). Occasional close-ups at least approximate more of a "real" high definition look, but even in many of those fine detail is lacking and the entire transfer has a soft, almost rubbery, appearance. Once again as with the first film the palette looks reasonably fresh and well saturated.

Mommy's Day Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

As with the first film, things are decidedly better with regard to the audio presentation than the video presentation. The LPCM 2.0 track included here sounds nicely full bodied, offering good support for the dialogue (such as it is), occasional effects, and the kind of whimsically humorous score. I noticed no problems with distortion, dropouts or other damage.

Mommy's Day Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The Blu-ray disc offers the following supplements:

• Commentary for both films feature writer and director Max Allan Collins, with director of photography and editor Phillip W. Dingeldein. The Commentaries are accessible under the Setup Menu.

For a list of supplements found on the Bonus DVD included in this set, please see our Mommy & Mommy's Day Blu-ray review.

Mommy's Day Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Mommy's Day struggles to develop a bit of suspense with regard to who's doing the killing this time around, but the ultimate reveal is a bit of a cheat, really. It's fun to see several of the supporting cast from the first film returning, along with none other than Paul Petersen from the old Donna Reed Show in a featured role, but the film never totally succeeds in providing chills or laughs. Once again, video is quite problematic looking, though audio is fine, and the standard def supplements on the included bonus DVD appealing, for those who are considering making a purchase.