Nightmare Fuel / The Babadook

If it's in a word, or it's in a look... you can't get rid of the Babadook.

BA...BA...DOOK...DOOK...DOOK...!

• First 20 seconds of the film, as the camera holds on Amelia's exhausted face and Sam can be heard crying "mummy", symbolizing how damaged as she witnesses Oskar's death. There's a scene later on in the film similar to it, hinting this has happened before...
• The Babadook making its first full appearance to Amelia at night. The erratic, jerky way it moves and croaks before showing its terrifying visage is chilling.
  • The second time it appears is even worse, and is arguably one of the scariest moments in the entire film. Amelia is in the living room, the lights are flickering like crazy, and then she gets the feeling of something behind her in the kitchen. She turns around, looking at the dark doorway on the other side of the kitchen... and the Babadook slowly, silently moves out of the shadows, its top hat and claws illuminated in the moonlight. It does nothing for a moment, just looming over Amelia... and then its claws extend.
  • Just as bad is the possession scene right after. After Amelia barricades herself in a den and cowers against the wall, a top hat falls down from the chimney next to her. She throws herself forward, seemingly struggling to even crawl away, and looks back: shiny claws are reaching down out of the chimney. She starts crawling away faster, and a coat is thrown down next to her, and then you realize what the Babadook is doing: it's taking off its funny disguise.
• The images in the book both before and after Amelia rips it up and later has it reassembled.
  • While the images might be interpreted as Ugly Cute (in a similar vein as The Nightmare Before Christmas), what really drives home the creepiness are the words. This movie made you scared of a pop-up book.
  • While early drawings of the Babadook may have the Ugly Cute vibe, the later drawings of Amelia looking completely insane most certainly do not. She has hollow, soulless black pits where her eyes should be and her facial expression alternates between a frenzied murderous grimace and a horrific Slasher Smile that's like the Babadook's own creepy smile. The pictures are almost more disturbing than the actual insanity later in the film.
  • The whole tone of the book is wildly inappropriate for children and very dark even for most adults. Somehow the fact it's dressed up as a book for kids makes this dissonance really disturbing, because it feels like whoever created it (possibly Amelia herself) was making a malicious attempt to deliberately terrify children.
• Amelia and Sam are in their bed. There's an eerie scratching at the door, followed by a reassuring bark. Relieved, Amelia gets up to let the dog in. Then, after she gets back into bed, there's another, identical scratching at the door. And this time, the door opens by itself...
• The voice going "Ba... ba... dook!" Made worse by the fact that at first it almost sounds like it's saying "Mama."
  • It's somehow becomes scarier when you realize that the voice and the creature itself weren't played by a traditional creature suit actor like Doug Jones. It's all the assistant art director Tim Purcell. Yikes.
  • It also sounds rather like "Papa took." And of course Sam's papa was taken.
• When Amelia, under the influence of the Babadook, strangles her poor, cute little dog before brutally snapping his neck. Watching the poor thing's body twitch while she does it is just the icing on the nightmare fuel cake.
  • Hearing its cries segue from whimpers to frightened whines to desperate snarls to choking sounds doesn't help either, as it implies it's not an Evil-Detecting Dog and doesn't realize anything supernatural is happening: it's a complete innocent, and feels betrayed by an owner it trusted.
  • More disturbing still...it's heavily implied the Babadook is merely figurative for insanity/depression. So perhaps Amelia is simply murdering her beloved dog without any supernatural possession at all...
• Essie Davis' entire unhinged performance as Babadook-Amelia could be said to be this. She's terrifying.
  • The ghastly things she says to her son; it's understandable that he wets himself when she approaches him.
    Amelia: Sometimes I just want to smash your head against a brick wall until your fucking brains pop out!
  • The particular instance before that has her banging against the door demanding Samuel to let her in, in lieu of how an abusive parent would. Except most abusive parents don't climb onto the door in an animalistic fashion and kick the door down while snarling and growling.
  • When she gets inside, she screams at him in a horrible shriek with awful vocal layering. After Samuel wets himself, she walks towards him, except she's not walking she's floating complete with creepy sounds.
  • A subtler example is when she answers the door to find Ms. Roach. She peeks the door open and her face is draped in shadow except for her dull eyes, showing just how far she's gone.
• After listening to Mrs. Roach, Amelia seems to be back to normal, and tries to plead for Samuel's forgiveness. Then, she starts saying she wants him to meet his father, and her hands, which seemed like they were wrapping him into a hug, start to close over his throat... Luckily, Samuel doesn't buy the act and stabs her before slipping away.
• One line: You can bring me the boy.
  • Another line: "You're not my mother!" "I AM YOUR MOTHER!"
• The scene where Amelia is flipping through TV channels late at night, only to see the Babadook appear on the TV screen on several occasions for a second, causing her to do a double take. The truly terrifying moment comes when she flips to a news report about a mother who had murdered her young son ... just like the extra pages in the book predicted that Amelia would do to Sam. Then, suddenly, towards the end of the report, Amelia spots a woman on the television, staring out of the window, and looks closer... and it is Amelia herself, giving the mother of all slasher smiles. It is chilling. It's especially effective due to working like a "when you see it" image. You might not notice it at first, but once you do, it's absolutely terrifying and feels incredibly wrong.
• The truly horrifying scene where Amelia wakes up, having fallen asleep in her chair, and glances over to the sofa... and is greeted with the sight of Sam's bloodied, wide-eyed corpse, having apparently been stabbed to death. Amelia immediately starts moaning in utter horror, only to hear Sam's voice yelling at her... oh, thank god, Sam's alive, and it was all just a hallucination - then Amelia looks at her hand and realizes that she's brandishing the kitchen knife once again without being consciously aware of it.
• Towards the very end of the movie, after Amelia screams the Babadook into submission, we're treated to genuinely heartwarming scenes. The family appears to have healed itself, and the Babadook seems to be gone. Until you realize it's still in their basement, being sated with worms fed to it. That's a new one.
• When Amelia goes to the police station, she sees a jacket and hat with long, black gloves hanging in the back. It's the Babadook, in plain sight, barely ten feet from people who could help her. She knows, and the audience knows, that there is nothing she can say that wouldn't make her look completely insane. The thing is right there and no one can help her. It's especially worrying because monsters tend to stay away from populated areas, but not this one.
  • Mindful of the obvious subtext behind the Babadook's manifestation, the two points mentioned above are the scariest parts about this "monster": it may only be figurative outside of fiction, but it's real, it's always following you, and while you can learn to live with it, you can never fully be rid of it.
• On a couple of occasions, Amelia is busy washing the dishes and we can see that her kitchen window is directly opposite Mrs. Roach's living room window. The first time, she glances out to see Mrs. Roach sitting and watching TV. The second time, she sees the same thing, only the Babadook is standing silently in the background, staring at Mrs. Roach. Amelia is so startled she drops the plate she was cleaning, and when she looks again, the Babadook is gone.
• At the end, the Babadook makes a final attempt to break Amelia by showing her a vision of Oskar's death - revealing that Oskar died by having the top of his head sliced off diagonally in the car accident. It's the only gory image in the film, and it isn't pretty.
• Even before events become overtly supernatural, Amelia's physical and emotional decline as she misses night after night of sleep rates as this trope for anyone who's had to cope with severe insomnia.
• The film's soundtrack is exceptionally creepy:
  • One song sounds like a demonic music box and features what sounds like Samuel calling out to his mom. Even worse is the way it distorts and slows down during the creepy TV scene.
  • The credits has a eerie piano song with what sounds like distorted animal calls in the background.
  • One song has what sounds like a group of children singing very out of key.

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