After reading Julie Gregory's excellent autobiography "Sickened" (2004), about her experiences growing up with a Munchhausen by Proxy mother, I was eager to rent a documentary and learn more about this strange form of child abuse. Unfortunately, Nonny de la Peña's "Mama/M.A.M.A." is an extended opinion piece rather than a balanced work of reporting, choosing to focus exclusively on a trio of mothers who may or may not have been wrongly accused.
While these stories are important to tell--and I suspect that at least one of the three women WAS wrongly accused--it's evident that the filmmaker doesn't believe MbP exists at all. In attempting to show how a very real phenomenon can feed into moral panic and promote false accusations, de la Peña eventually goes to the other extreme--denying that the phenomenon exists at all. By the end of this film, you'll feel frustrated and a bit misled.
While these stories are important to tell--and I suspect that at least one of the three women WAS wrongly accused--it's evident that the filmmaker doesn't believe MbP exists at all. In attempting to show how a very real phenomenon can feed into moral panic and promote false accusations, de la Peña eventually goes to the other extreme--denying that the phenomenon exists at all. By the end of this film, you'll feel frustrated and a bit misled.