A One Mann’s Movies review of “Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother”. (From the 2026 London Film Festival). (2026, 5*, NR).
Wowzer! I went into this film with no expectations. I had read the brief LFF synopsis for Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother before the festival, and marked this as “one to see”, but had clearly forgotten the context. What followed was a most unexpected thrill-ride rocketing this into one of my films of the year.
One Mann’s Movies Rating:
Plot:
An assassin and father of three, Latif (Mahershala Ali) has his life turned upside down when his wife dies. He struggles to balance his two very different worlds, but he is caught between two warring parties, he sets off on a desperate journey to protect his children.
Certification:
UK: NR; US: NR. (This film has not yet received a classification by the BBFC, but I would expect it to be a 15 based on violence and strong language.)
Talent:
Starring: Mahershala Ali, John Cho, Laith Nakli, Adia, Giancarlo Esposito, Abubakr Ali, Adia, Jahleel Kamara, Tiffany Boone, Tramell Tillman, John Henry Ward, Shakirah DeMesier, Brooklyn Hughes, Jaxon Hughes.
Directed by: Bassam Tariq.
Written by: Bassam Tariq.
Running Time: 1h 51m.
Review:
Positives:
- The opening of the film grabbed me by the balls and didn’t let go! The film starts with the quotation from the Islamic Hadith (which is well-known to Moslems but was previously unknown to me):
A man asks Prophet Muhammad, “Who deserves the best of me?” The Prophet replies, “Your mother.” When the man asks three times in total, the Prophet answers “Your mother” each time. *
(* I’ve left out the end of this story, as indeed the film does at the start. This is obviously known to most Moslems, but for the Christian and secular viewers, most will not know it and it was nice (and powerful) for the film to reveal the full quotation in its finale.)
- We then savagely cut to a bathroom fight scene reminiscent of the start of Casino Royale. It’s brutal, it’s bloody, it’s very porcelain-ey. This is Latif (Mahershala Ali) in ‘work mode’ as a hit-man, but a hit-man with a difference: we realise we are in new territory here when he wipes down his bloody knife with a nappy and some baby wipes he happens to have in his bag! Latif is about to clean up the mess he’s made when he receives a devastating call that his wife, Khadija (Shakirah DeMesier), has died. He drops everything, much to the annoyance of his ‘handler’ Mike (Laith Nakli). Latif is not your traditional hit-man. He is a devout Muslim, doesn’t carry a gun and has three kids at home who think he is a salesman. (Some echoes of True Lies and Nobody here.) One of these kids is merely a baby and allergic to formula, so much of the plot revolves around a frantic effort to secure breast milk. It’s an absolutely riveting first ten minutes as we are introduced to his work, his home life and the ‘Arab’ Mike.
- One thing intriguing with the film is that it is has no sense of ‘place’. With comments made about “the feds”, I assumed that this was set in a US city. But it’s not made explicit and this could be centred on any mosque anywhere around the world.
- The film is remarkably spiritual, offering another view into an Islamic funeral: my second at the LFF after the excellent In a Whisper. After Latif rails in fury against Allah for taking his wife, the kindness and compassion of the local Imam, Abdul Malik (Giancarlo Esposito) and, later in the film, the women of the mosque, shines through demonstrating that Islam is centred on compassion (Rahmah), mercy, and justice – not all of the paranoid and hateful attributes US social media scaremongering seems to be constantly peddling. The spiritualism comes to a defining head at the end of the film: an event that will definitely divide audiences.
- The story is terrific revolving around an absurd character called Hatty (Abubakr Ali): someone who trafficks young women to be in his dodgy porn films. He is associated with Mike and struts around, dressed absurdly and spouting offensive comments about his girls, describing them as “Hatty’s Hoe-jobs” and “Mecca MILFs”. However, the porn is a direct target of the nutty religious right movement – the Church of Divine Fire – led by Pastor Hwan (a larger than life John Cho) who has ill-intent for Hatty and his porn-mansion-studio. Mike wants to hire Latif to “take out kimchi Jesus”, but he ends up being the pawn in the middle between the battle of the rival gangs.
- The action is really well shot. We get Nobody-style fights which get quite brutal: gloves dipped in Vaseline then dipped in broken glass – eek. A massacre twists the action into a revenge thriller that gives off strong Equalizer vibes, but with a black, ninja-suited Ali looking if anything even more imposing and threatening that Denzel Washington…. and that’s saying something!
- For a thriller, there are a lot of laughs:
- Latif catches his teenage daughter Fatiha (Adia) watching Hatty’s bizarre ‘chipmunk porn’ on her laptop. “Which wifi are you using for this?” he barks. It’s OK, she replies, it’s the Mormons in the unit next door (led by Elder Wade (John Henry Ward) that we meet later).
- Fatiha to Latif: “Why did your homies bring hookers to the mosque?” “They were there to learn about Islam” replies Latif!
- When a shoot-up starts at a brothel, Hwan shouts “Don’t shoot, there’s a baby here!”. (The film has ‘goodies’ and ‘baddies’, but everyone is nicely nuanced, having good as well as bad qualities.)
- As well as to thrill and to make you laugh, the film has the ability to move you and, at times, surprisingly. Needing a car at one point, Latif jumps into his wife’s car. The seat is still all the way forward, from the last time his wife drove it. We see a subliminal shot of her coffee cup in the central console, her lipstick still on the rim. A poignant reminder of how life can change in an instant.
Negatives:
- I’ve put the finale of the film under “Negatives” since I think it is the moment that will most divide audiences. I can’t go into details for reasons of spoilers…. but you’ll know it when you get there. It is brilliantly shot by Bassam Tariq (who did the acclaimed Mogul Mowgli, which I still have to see): a surprising and extraordinary bit of cinema that sticks in the mind.
- The title of the film is a bit of a mouthful (but then that didn’t seem to do a lot of harm to Everything Everywhere All At Once!) I guess the advantage of the film will be that it will attract an audience from the 2 billion people on the planet who practice Islam, who will recognise and be attracted to that title. But for the 6 billion other folks, the marketing might require more effort than it would have done with a more religiously-neutral title. (Just my view: don’t shout at me!)
Summary Thoughts:
This film is a rush. On coming out of the cinema I ran into Joe Warne of Bath Sound Radio (who I met at this LFF and had lots of interesting chats with.) We both looked at each other and both went “WOW!” It was one of the big surprises for me at the LFF.
Watch out for this one. I think it will be a bit hit for Amazon on streaming: it came out in cinemas on September 28th in the US, but only in a very limited release. UK audiences can see it from 20th November 2026, and hopefully it will get a decent theatrical release here.
Where to watch?
Trailer:
The trailer for the film is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEcoV-ngH38.
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