Serial Mother: Why do we love the psycho hidden inside an ordinary person?

Evil Heroines: The madwoman draws us in with terror

MF editorial team

24 May 2014

updated the 14 July 2015 à 18:35

And what if the monster you have been afraid of since you were a little girl…was actually hidden in you? The mad Serial Mother gets our sympathy for a reason…

“As children, we believe that a monster lurks under the bed,” said the psychoanalyst. As adults, we realize that it is not under the mattress, but buried within us. “This is what we use to justify the behaviour of the mad villain.

Who could believe that the harmless reader of rose-scented novels in Misery is actually a psychopath? Or the exemplary mother played by Kathleen Turner in Serial Mother uses her perfectly polished kitchen knives to slay intruders?

“This madness draws us in, especially because it appears before us every day,” says Didier Roth-Bettoni. And we watch her as we contemplate a void – with fright, but wondering if may not be (just a little bit) satisfying to leave them be.