‘Umma’ Review: Sandra Oh Fears She’s Turning Into Her Mother in This Supernatural Horror Exercise
variety.comAndrew Barker Senior Features WriterIt’s an eternal middle-aged anxiety: “I feel like I’m turning into my mother.” And it’s given a most literal rendering in Iris K.
Shim’s supernatural horror exercise “Umma,” in which Sandra Oh stars as a rural beekeeper inhabited by the vengeful spirit of her estranged mom.
But while that premise might sound like the makings of a tongue-in-cheek body-swap fright-fest, “Umma” has far heavier issues on its plate, which proves both its chief virtue and its ultimate undoing, as it never manages to thread the needle between its horror setpieces and the more serious themes of generational trauma lying beneath.Set in an unnamed stretch of American farmland, “Umma” opens on Amanda (Oh), a resourceful first-generation Korean American who has managed to construct a stable life selling organic honey to a devoted online fanbase of influencers.
Not that she knows what the terms “influencer” or “online” even mean: owing to a professed allergy to electricity, Amanda lives entirely off the grid, using analog machinery and candles around the house, and enforcing a strict ban on cellphones and gadgets on her property.
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