FANTASIA25 REVIEW: Mother of Flies [2026]

Rating: NR | Runtime: 92 minutes
Release Date: 2026 (USA)
Studio: Shudder
Director(s): John Adams, Zelda Adams & Toby Poser
Writer(s): John Adams, Zelda Adams & Toby Poser

It’s as beautiful dead as it was alive.

The cancer is back. What had been a fifty-fifty chance of survival the first time around is now a six-months-to-live scenario. So, Mickey (Zelda Adams) is out of options. She must either resign herself to her impending demise or listen to the mystical voice that’s infiltrated her dreams. Why not give the latter a shot? If there is literally nothing to lose, who would it harm? Her father’s (John Adams’ Jake) patience will be tested (he’s told her he’ll be by her side no matter what she chooses) and Mickey’s pain will inevitably increase (she blindly accepted suffering from scientific poison, so magical poison shouldn’t detract her), but there’s a non-zero chance it could help. Even if just as a psychological placebo.

If you’re familiar with The Adams Family’s work, however, you’ll know they don’t wade through supernatural waters without ensuring we understand the magic, evil, or occult avenues traveled are very much real. The question we seek to have answered within Mother of Flies is therefore less about the how and more about the why. Because Solveig (Toby Poser) is definitely not pretending, regardless of whether the rituals she performs will succeed. Everything she says and does creates a physical reaction that goes beyond hallucination, but we don’t know if we can trust that it’s not making things worse. All we know for certain is that she’s using Mickey’s illness for personal gain. What that is remains unknown.

The hope is that we’ll glean details from flashbacks showing us Solveig at work saving another dying woman. This time it’s a mother who will not survive her pregnancy and thus needs this witch to remove the stillborn before it’s too late. To our surprise—considering demonic scenes of a blood-soaked Solveig writhing naked in mud—she does save her patient. What’s unsurprising, though, is that her smile during the aftermath isn’t a product of this victory. No, her grin is directed towards the lifeless child held in her arms. She looks at it as though it’s alive. To the young woman’s family’s dismay, she sees its passing as a silver lining. And why not? Solveig basks in decomposing flesh and maggot colonies. Death is beautiful.

Written and directed by the trio of John, Zelda, and Toby (Lulu Adams eventually appears in an acting role as well), the film presents itself as Mickey’s story. She’s the one in need of healing. She’s the one who drove out to the middle of nowhere to embrace witchcraft. She’s the one taking a leap of faith despite never having cared much for the ritual of religion. And yet her position within the narrative is unchanging. Mickey’s decision is made before we meet her and she will not waver from its last-ditch effort motivation. She’s so committed that she’ll send her father away if he dares belittle what it is she’s trying to accomplish. Regardless of Solveig being a real witch or her process working, Mickey will live or die trying.

So, our focus must turn towards Solveig as a result. The mystery of who she is. The reactions of townsfolk when Jake mentions her name. The reason why she’s willing to help this stranger, seemingly without compensation. Our initial assumption is that it’s out of a desire for evil. Like with all such plots revolving around cheating death, it’s well-established that a price must be paid. Is Solveig going to take Mickey’s soul? Does Jake’s presence mean she will kill him to save his daughter? Could it all be a giant ruse to murder them both and use their blood and bones for some other ritualistic manifestation outside the scope of our knowledge? Or, considering the effects of her magic, is Solveig telling the truth and merely in search of redemption?

The slow pacing and circuitous plotting that causes some Adams Family films to lose me is also present here during its middle third, but the final act arrives to give that process purpose by taking us somewhere unexpected. We’re meant to be lulled into the security of our genre preconceptions and the notion of dark magic. We’re meant to read into the balancing-the-scales trope and think we have it all figured out so that the truth—albeit never hidden—catches us off-guard. Whereas so many horror films lean into the idea that darkness is conquered by light, Mother of Flies posits that the darkness might crave some light too. And, similar to the chemotherapy analogy, why can’t the trade be death for life rather than life for death?

To our benefit, we get a bit of both in the end. Yes, there are a lot of demonic earmarks from burning corpses to parasites and the unnatural, but there are just as many examples of love transcending reason too. While he makes light of his answer to Mickey’s question about what he’ll do if she doesn’t survive, Jake tells her without a beat that he will kill himself to make sure she’s safe in death as he has in life. That conviction is what drives the film and a trait that Solveig can respect and, perhaps, knows intimately herself. So, rather than always be about an increasing body count and fear of oblivion, the Adams Family uses their horror to decrease it by reminding us witchcraft mustn’t always be evil.