A Fistful of Mamas! (Brad's Picks)

Hopefully this weekend will be ruled by Arnold Schwarzenegger's comeback special, The Last Stand.  I want that flick to kick unholy amounts of ass and lead into the great King Conan resurrection of 2014. One can dream, right?  But instead of celebrating cinema's greatest last stands, I was more interested in paying tribute to the great movie mamas.  Reviews seem to be ranging from mixed to negative in regards to the Guillermo Del Toro produced horror vehicle, but I'm always down for a good ghost story even when the genre seems to be completely played out.  I surely hope this is not Jessica Chastain's Norbit.  

5.  Mama Sawyer (Leatherface - Texas Chainsaw Massacre III):  The Saw Is Family.  And Mama Sawyer has to work her cancer throated ass off to keep her boys in line.  Can't have them straying into the arms of free spirit Michelle - we gotta remember, she's just meat for the barbecue.  But Mama Sawyer really makes the list cuz she raised Viggo Mortensen up right.  He's the true horror of the franchise - as fun as Matthew McConaughey is in Next Generation, Mortensen's Hitchhiker is genuinely spooky with his smiles and squeals.  A boy raised proper by his cannibal mama.

4.  Mama Fratelli (The Goonies):  Another mama who knows how to handle her criminal offspring.  This is a theme you'll find throughout the rest of the list.  But she knows the true pleasures in life - gasoline fires, sloths, and the art of kiddie hand puree.  She has a face only a mother could love, but I'd be terrified to meet her mama.  Only weakness?  Baby Ruths.

3.  Ma-Ma (Dredd):  It's easy to gush praise over Karl Urban's beautifully frowny Judge Dredd, but you also have to give props to Lena Headey's violent overlord.  Rocking a mean facial scar and an even meaner gatling gun trigger finger.  She'll skin a snitch as quickly as she'll butcher an entire city block of crossfired families.  Takes pride in her work.

2.  Lee Daniels (Black Mama, White Mama):  Maybe not as killer as Coffy or Foxy Brown (or even Friday Foster), Pam Grier's Black Mama is still a whole lotta woman.  Chained to the too often whiney, Margaret Markov, Ms. Grier has to convince the harem girl to join her cause and take down an army of racist gangsters.  It's all cat fights and undercover nuns - that is, until Pam Grier lays down the ultimate smackdown on the devilish Lynn Borden.

1.  Wilma McClatchie (Big Bad Mama):  Angie Dickinson sexually conquers both William Shatner and Tom Skerritt all the while raising her poor white trash daughters on the mean, dusty streets of Depression era America.  She tommy guns her way through Royal Dano's pious preacher, Dick Miller's reckless G-Man, and Noble Willingham's diabolical Uncle Barney.  Cheeze & Sleaze of the highest exploitation order.

--Brad