The Babadook (2014)

Kent turns a children's pop-up book into a vehicle for grief so aggressive it makes you want to check on every single parent you know. The real monster is exhaustion, resentment, and the love that survives both. Essie Davis delivers a performance that starts at frayed and ends somewhere past the event horizon. The actual Babadook is almost beside the point — the scariest scenes are just a mother trying to hold it together at the dinner table.