Warning: The following article contains major spoilers for Hold Your Breath. Reader discretion is advised.
In the psychological horror film Hold Your Breath, directed by Karrie Crouse and William Joines, Margaret Bellum, portrayed by Sarah Paulson, grapples not only with a storm but also with her escalating madness. Margaret lives in 1933, in Oklahoma, amidst the great Dust Bowl.
Her life with her two daughters, Rose and Ollie, is consumed by her efforts to protect them from harm. The threat of the notorious Gray Man—a dreadful figure in a tale told to the girls—comes alive, embodying evil entering their world. The Gray Man, however, is revealed not as an external threat but as Margaret herself.
The ending is chillingly conclusive and ties together all the key points: what happens to Margaret, the fate of the Gray Man, and the psychological horror that runs throughout the film. Read on!
Hold Your Breath: Margaret’s paranoia and The Gray Man
In Hold Your Breath, the plot revolves around motherhood, loss, and mental decline. Margaret fights a relentless battle, first against the dust (symbolic of environmental disaster), and then against her psychological demons. These events drive her into an increasingly paranoid state.
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According to DMTalkies, "Margaret made it her life's mission to do everything she had to do to ensure her girls were safe," even going so far as to cover every crack in their house to prevent the dust from entering, as shown in Hold Your Breath.
The Gray Man is introduced as a figure from a tale told by Rose to her younger sister, Ollie. He represents Margaret's fears—primarily the same disease that took away her eldest child, Ada, and might also take away her remaining daughters.
When Rose tells Ollie, "The Gray Man... seeps through the cracks... You'll breathe him in... do terrible things," the mythological figure becomes a representation of the very real dangers Margaret faces, as well as her growing anxiety.
Ebon Moss-Bachrach plays Wallace Grady, whom the Bellum children initially confront as a stranger but who could bring them rain, restoring hope in Margaret’s eyes.
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But when Margaret receives a letter from her husband, revealing Wallace's darker side, she must confront him. This spirals out of control when she discovers Wallace’s involvement with the Gray Man, leading to tragedy. Margaret’s fear and obsession become the very monster she sought to protect her family from.
What happens to Margaret at the end of Hold Your Breath?
The climax of Hold Your Breath brings Margaret to the peak of her madness. Drenched in hallucinations, she believes she is fighting the Gray Man, the embodiment of her greatest fear and guilt.
Screen Rant notes:
"Margaret is unable to protect them from the true threat: herself."
Already having taken away from her sanity, the dust pushes her into acts of violence against those she loves. They include her sister-in-law Esther and Sheriff Bell whom she mistook as threats in Hold Your Breath.
It's in the last scene that Margaret is enveloped by a dust storm and gasps for air. Her daughters, Rose and Ollie, run for their lives. An ending shrouded with ambiguity: the fleeing daughters march toward a brighter future. But the lingering dust recollects their traumatic past and how such haunting legacies would reside.
As they board the train, Rose reviews their newfound security. The haunting presence of dust (the literal and metaphorical kind) haunts them, which suggests that they may never really escape the turmoil created by their mother.
Hold Your Breath shows how a disaster can reflect inner turmoil, in this case, the psychological breakdown of the protagonist. The haunting imagery in the film and the complex relationship between Margaret and her daughters raise a question in the minds of viewers: how much trauma is too much?
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Hold Your Breath is streaming now on Hulu.
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