Thursday Movie Picks: Mother-Son Relationships (Biologically Related)

This week’s theme has been surprisingly difficult, and I had to break the rules a little too. If you’re not familiar with the Thursday Movie Picks, it’s an amazing thing hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves. Each week brings a new theme, and all you need to do is pick 3 movies that fit the bill to discuss. This week is one of many 'All in the Family Editions', this time featuring Mother-Son relationships.

Only God Forgives is probably the anti-choice for this week’s themes, as I can’t imagine the mother has a ‘Best Mum Ever’ mug at home for her actions. Ryan Gosling’s character’s brother is murdered and his crime lord mother compels him to hunt down his killer and cause trouble. Still, I’d like to think it shows how much he loves his mother to go and do this at her command, but maybe he’s equally afraid of her? This movie made little sense at the best of times!

How to Train your Dragon 2 introduced us to a character we thought was long gone, Hiccup’s mother! (Not a spoiler - much to my disappointment this was all over the trailers). Getting to see Hiccup reunite with his mother after all those years and to see the similarities in the two of them was heart warming and a real highlight of the whole film. If only it could have been kept as a surprise.

Here are my three:

Who doesn't love Shaun's mum in Shaun of the Dead and who wasn't completely heartbroken when he realised she had been bitten.  As well as the awkward everyone threatening to stab each other stand off while there is a gun pointed at his mum!   It was one of the really emotionally moments in this zom-com that made us all fall in love with the Cornetto trilogy.

At the beginning of this movie, Trevor's mom, Arlene (Helen Hunt) is a bit of a waster, she keeps letting her alcoholic, abusive ex (and Trevor's father) back into their lives while apparently skipping on much of her parental duties.  However, as the film moves forward you learn more about Arlene and what she has been through and she also realises what her son actually needs from her.  Its great to watch Trevor (Haley Joel Osment) be the parent in there relationship and to see the tables turn as the story progresses.

This is where I am technically cheating because the reason I chose this film was because of the relationship between Leigh Anne (Sandra Bullock) and Michael (Quinton Aaron), hence the cheating as they are not biologically related.  However, the more I thought about it the more I considered her relationship with her biological son SJ (Jae Head).  He has been raised with all the luxuries in life and has never wanted for anything and yet he is willing to share his whole life with Michael because of the way he has been raised.  My all time favourite scene in this movie is after the boys are in a car crash while Michael was driving, Leigh Anne is running down the street shouting 'My kids, they are my kids...' such a heart-warming moment.