‘Mother!,” Darren Aronofsky’s tour de force of allegorical misdirection, is about many things, in succession and simultaneously. What begins as a creepily insinuating chamber piece of domestic discord quickly takes on more metaphorical meanings, with drama giving way to outright horror: Here, a parable of marital anxiety becomes a lurid, Boschlike meditation on environmental destruction, idolatry and — ultimately — blind devotion to a greedy and insatiable god.
Mostly, though, this intriguing but ultimately frustratingly undisciplined experiment is about Jennifer Lawrence, who proves once again what a supernatural screen presence she is, delivering a performance of transparency, stillness, physical grit and self-sacrificing courage. As the enigmatic title character, she’s our surrogate and guide through the highly charged environment Aronofsky has conceived: In this case, it’s an elegant Victorian house, standing regally in a serene field, that Lawrence’s character is restoring as an idyllic home and creative cocoon for her husband, a famous poet played by Javier Bardem.
Fans of “The Shining” will think they have “Mother!” sussed when Bardem turns out to be blocked and when Lawrence’s wary but radiant heroine begins to sense a beating heart underneath the house’s sturdy bones. But then a strange couple — played in wickedly observant turns by Ed Harris and Michelle Pfeiffer — shows up, injecting a malign, anarchic force reminiscent of Sidney Blackmer and Ruth Gordon in “Rosemary’s Baby.”
And, yes, a Polanskian air of maternal dread — the primal fear of loss of control and privacy — suffuses “Mother!,” which at its most astute and provocative could be a mirror to Aronofsky’s own ambivalence about fame. Specifically, he seems to be zeroing in on auteur worship, parasitic fandom and women playing muse, vessel and protective space-maker for male genius. Lawrence, who exudes a stunning combination of innocence and watchful wisdom, pads through the characters’ eight-sided house with the same alarm as Mia Farrow four decades ago, but also with more assurance and self-possession as the stakes of her fight become not just higher, but surreally so.