I DISMEMBER MAMA

Albert once tried to kill his rich, snobbish mother, for which he was institutionalized. The low-security hospital he was sent to, however, is not prepared to deal with the extent of his problems. Obsessed with hatred for his mother, Albert is dangerously violent toward all women and attacks a nurse, after which his doctor decides to send him to a high-security state institution. Albert easily escapes by murdering an orderly and the police put his mother in hiding after he phones her and threatens her. When Albert returns to his mother's home, he finds her housekeeper Alice, whom he tortures and murders.

When Alice's 9-year-old daughter Annie returns home from school, Albert immediately takes a liking to her and tells her that her mother has gone to the hospital and left him to take care of Annie while she is away. Albert reverts to a childlike persona and they immediately form a friendship, playing games, talking and laughing together. Albert takes Annie on a day of activities like riding paddleboats and a small train; that night he takes her to a hotel where they conduct a mock wedding ritual. Albert considers Annie to be a pure "woman" and believes he truly loves her.

When his sexual attraction to her manifests itself while she is sleeping, Albert goes out and picks up a woman in a bar and brings her back to the hotel room. His bizarre sadism re-emerges and he murders the woman, but Annie wakes up and sees it happening. She screams and escapes out of a window, climbing down the fire escape as Albert chases after her. They run into a mannequin factory, where Annie attempts to hide among the figures. Albert sees her, envisions her wearing makeup like a harlot, and decides she is just like all the other women after all. When he attempts to kill her with a cleaver, Annie defends herself by pushing Albert with one of the mannequins. Albert falls backwards out of a fourth story window onto the concrete below. The police arrive moments later and comfort Annie as Albert lies dying on the ground.

Albert is killed after a final confrontation with Annie in a mannequin factory, falling to his death as the police rescue Annie.

The climax resolves Albert's rampage through a mix of psychological and physical confrontation, with Annie—his supposed exception—forced to defend herself. The ending underscores the film’s themes of corrupted innocence and the destructive power of unresolved trauma, closing the cycle of violence Albert embodied.