
‘Mother’s Baby’ Viennale Review: The Uneasy Space Between Postpartum Depression and Horror
After a complicated birth, a new mother becomes convinced that something happened while her baby was taken away —or maybe her own mind is unraveling. This Austrian film blurs the boundaries between postpartum depression and psychological horror.
Postpartum depression is not only a recurring theme in life but also in cinema. Dramas, thrillers, and even horror films have explored the disquieting feelings that can take hold of new mothers after giving birth. Mother’s Baby, the latest film by Austrian director Johanna Moder —which competed at this year’s Berlinale and is now opening in her home country— centers precisely on that subject. But instead of approaching it from a single angle, Moder constructs her film along two parallel tracks. On one side, it’s a deeply personal drama about a woman’s emotional collapse; on the other, it gradually turns into a film of mystery and psychological suspense, with echoes of Rosemary’s Baby and other classics of maternal terror.
From the outset, Mother’s Baby carries a sense of unease. Julia (Marie Leuenberger), a talented orchestra conductor, and her husband Georg (Hans Löw) have struggled for years to conceive. In their desperation, they turn to a cold, impersonal fertility clinic run by the enigmatic Dr. Vilfort. The doctor, played by Danish actor Claes Bang —who so often embodies quietly disturbing figures, whether in The Square or as Count Dracula himself— brings a calculated detachment to the role, the kind that makes viewers suspect that nothing good can possibly come out of this encounter.
Months later, the long-awaited pregnancy ends in a difficult, painful birth. Moments after the baby arrives, he is taken away by Dr. Vilfort and his equally grim assistants. They tell the parents that the newborn has oxygen problems and must be transferred immediately to another hospital. Julia and Georg wait —oddly calm, perhaps in shock— while time drags on in a void of uncertainty. When the doctor finally returns, the baby is, according to him, perfectly fine: smaller than expected, but healthy, quiet, and serene. The next morning, the couple goes home, trying to begin a new life that already feels strangely detached from reality.
But Julia senses something isn’t right. The baby sleeps all day, barely cries, doesn’t react to loud noises, and eats very little. While Georg attributes everything to luck, Julia can’t shake the feeling that something inexplicable happened in the hours after the birth. Was her baby switched? Did the clinic hide something from them? Or is she losing her mind? These questions mark the beginning of a slow descent into uncertainty, where maternal instinct and paranoia become indistinguishable.

Moder directs these early stretches with the measured rhythm of an intimate character study rather than a conventional thriller. For almost two-thirds of the film, the story feels grounded in Julia’s emotional and psychological struggle: her inability to bond with the child, her growing isolation, the frustration of being replaced in a professional opportunity she’d been promised, and the suspicion that everyone —from her husband to her friends and even the social worker sent to check on her— sees her as unstable.
Her “investigation” into the clinic and the baby’s origins seems, at first, like an extension of that inner crisis, a symptom. Yet slowly, almost imperceptibly, the film takes a darker turn. What begins as a domestic drama starts to flirt with horror, then slides toward ambiguity, leaving both Julia and the audience trapped between psychological realism and uncanny mystery.
That dual narrative thread —half personal drama, half creeping thriller— is what makes Mother’s Baby both fascinating and uneven. Moder’s decision to walk that fine line between genres is bold, but it also creates tension in tone. Viewers drawn to the emotional and realistic side of the story may feel disoriented by the increasingly strange atmosphere that takes hold of the film’s final act. On the other hand, those expecting a chilling, conspiratorial thriller about medical experiments or baby swapping —one of the possibilities Julia herself imagines— might find Moder’s restrained pacing too contemplative, too elliptical. Still, it’s precisely that uncertain balance, that refusal to commit to either full-blown horror or straightforward drama, that gives Mother’s Baby its lingering, disquieting power.
Moder’s direction is quietly assured, building dread not through shocks but through mood, tone, and performance. The lighting grows colder, the spaces more sterile, and the faces around Julia increasingly unreadable. As viewers, we’re never quite sure if people are genuinely acting oddly or if it’s Julia’s perception that distorts everything around her. In this respect, Moder borrows a page from Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby: the world might be conspiring against her, or she might be trapped inside her own fear and exhaustion. Her husband, her colleagues, and even the social worker see nothing strange —in fact, they find the baby’s calm temperament enviable— but Julia becomes convinced that something monstrous hides behind that placid surface.
Moder proves clever enough to resolve the mystery and leave it open at the same time. The film reaches an ending that offers a form of closure while still allowing multiple interpretations. Whether Julia’s suspicions were justified or whether her mind collapsed under the weight of postpartum depression is left to the viewer. Some will find this ambiguity frustrating, but it’s the choice that best fits the material —and, above all, the protagonist’s fragile, overwhelmed state.