The Hand That Rocks The Cradle: Movie Review

Cast: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Maika Monroe
Director: Michelle Garza Cervera

The 2025 reenvisioning of the Annabella Sciorra/ Rebecca DeMornay 1992 psycho-thriller tries to emerge from the shadow of its original but can't quite shift from it.

This time around, Winstead plays Caitlin, a seemingly helpful mother-to-be, who's already struggling with a wilful first born. Happening on Polly (Monroe, who has a penchant for dead-eyed looks in this) at a meeting, the pair seemingly strikes up a bond.

And when they happen to meet at a market after the birth, Caitlin chooses to ask Polly if she'll come nanny for them on somewhat of a whim. But despite strict rules over giving the children sugar and not feeding baby with formula, polls playing fast and loose with the fam, wreaking havoc with their dynamic for her own nefarious reasons...

The 2025 version of the classic seems to occasionally lack an edge.

Despite both Winstead and Monroe bringing quality where the writing fails, the film never quite kicks into gear to build any sense of suspense or tension in all the very slow-burn build. Bizarrely, despite some undercurrents, it just all boils over in the final third without any real sense of fluidity or flow.

There's a lot of heavy signposting (literally) early on with a stop sign outside Caitlin's house being a major plot point, and this is endemic of some of what bought the remake- a distinct lack of edge that brings the frisson the original had.

It doesn't help that at the time the 1992 movie was out when we were in a glut of vengeful females seeking justice, and since then the dynamics felt stale and overplayed.

There's a muted overall feeling to proceedings and consequently The Hand That Rocks The Cradle barely manages to shake things up when it should have done, given Monroe's penchant for intensity.

It's not a complete disaster, but it does substantially fail to justify its own existence sadly

The Hand That Rocks The Cradle is streaming in Disney+ from Thursday October 22.