Toni Collette fails to save the flop

Mafia Mom ★★½
(MA) 101 minutes

Toni Collette has to be one of the busiest actors around. It is omnipresent – everything everywhere at once.

It’s actually one of the few films she hasn’t starred in, but she’s currently seen in cinemas and streaming services in a wide variety of moods, genres and circumstances.

Mafia Mom finds her in slapstick mode as Kristin Balbano, a woman confronted with a failing marriage and a faltering career when her life is turned upside down by a sudden demand from Italy. Her grandfather, whom she barely knew, is dead and he left her the family business. She has to leave for Rome in the next 24 hours.

The demand comes from Bianca, her grandfather’s trusted assistant, played by Monica Bellucci, whose sexual attraction has now combined with her natural command to the point that she doesn’t have to speak at all to get the message across: Don’t do anything to me. And the film’s feminist slant means she’s siding with Kristin. However, this is not as reassuring as it might seem as the family business is organized crime.

Collette throws herself into the role with great energy, which is fortunate because she needs it. As soon as they arrive, the trouble begins. As her grandfather’s funeral procession leaves the church after the ceremony, the coffin is sprayed with bullets, starting a firefight between the Balbanos and their nemesis, the Romanos.

The action from there is ridiculously fast and furious, with a generous helping of gore and gore presented in forensic detail. It’s cartoon violence, but I wouldn’t recommend watching the film before or after eating.

Everything is stripped away with an iron fist, including the joke, as Kristin undergoes a radical makeover—from her clothes and makeup to her psychological transformation from docile wife, mother, and downtrodden leader to full-blown feminist. She leaves her job at a pharmaceutical company run by a grinning boys’ club and begins listening to Bianca teach her about the art of self-preservation.