The Others (2001)

User Rating:

7.8/10   

Director:

Alejandro Amenábar

Writer:

Alejandro Amenábar (written by)

Release Date:

10 August 2001 (USA)

Genre:

Horror | Mystery | Thriller

Tagline:

Sooner or later she'll see them, then everything will be different.

Plot:

A woman who lives in a darkened old house with her two photosensitive children becomes convinced that her family home is haunted.

Plot Keywords:

Servant | Mansion | Photosensitive | WWII | Sunlight

Awards:

Nominated for Golden Globe. Another 22 wins & 36 nominations

Cast

Nicole Kidman	...	Grace Stewart
Fionnula Flanagan	...	Mrs. Bertha Mills
Christopher Eccleston	...	Charles Stewart
Alakina Mann	...	Anne Stewart
James Bentley	...	Nicholas Stewart
Eric Sykes	...	Mr. Edmund Tuttle
Elaine Cassidy	...	Lydia
Renée Asherson	...	Old Lady
Gordon Reid	...	Assistant
Keith Allen	...	Mr. Marlish
Michelle Fairley	...	Mrs. Marlish
Alexander Vince	...	Victor Marlish
Ricardo López	...	Second Assistant
Aldo Grilo	...	Gardener

Also Known As:

Les autres (France)
Los otros (Spain)
The Darkness (USA) (working title)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for thematic elements and frightening moments.

Runtime:

101 min | Finland:104 min | USA:104 min

Country:

USA | Spain | France | Italy

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

Malaysia:U | Canada:G (Quebec) | USA:PG-13 (certificate number not assigned) | Japan:U | Argentina:13 | Australia:M | Brazil:12 | Canada:PG | Chile:TE | Finland:K-15 | France:-12 | Germany:12 | Hong Kong:IIB | Iceland:12 | Ireland:15 | Netherlands:12 | New Zealand:M | Norway:15 | Peru:14 | Philippines:PG-13 | Portugal:M/16 (DVD rating) | Singapore:PG | South Korea:All | Spain:13 | Sweden:15 | Switzerland:14 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:14 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:14 (canton of the Grisons) | UK:12

Filming Locations:

Madrid, Spain

Company:

Cruise/Wagner Productions

Trivia:

Mateo Gil, screenwriter of Alejandro Amenábar's previous film Abre los ojos (1997), has a cameo as a dead man's photograph in the album.

Goofs:

Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Grace runs out with a shotgun, she mouths the words, "I'll shoot" but on the audio track she says "Don't Move".

Quotes:

Grace: LEAVE US IN PEACE.

Movie Connections:

References The Shining (1980)

Soundtrack:

Vals Opus 69 No.1 (Op. Posth.)

GOOD MOVIE!!!

'The Others' really reminds me of how much fun going to the movies can be! If you're looking for a scary date movie, look no further. This one will have the girls clutching the arms of their boyfriends throughout!

Nicole Kidman is Grace, an emphatically religious woman, devoted to her two creepy children, who appear to be afflicted with a severe sensitivity to light, so much so that they can not handle anything more than candlelight (which conveniently allows for lots of dark atmosphere to occupy the film). Every door in her huge, cavernous Victorian mansion off the coast of England must be closed and locked before the next can be opened, in order to prevent any light from leaking into a room where her children may be. Grace's husband is off fighting the war (WWII), which, strangely has just come to an end when the film opens. Of course, the audience can pretty much deduce that the poor guy has died during battle. Out of nowhere enter three domestic servants, apparently arriving to replace the previous three domestic servants who have abruptly and mysteriously disappeared one week earlier.

Things seem to be going along rather smoothly: servants tending to the house and kids (especially the bratty daughter, played to spine-tingly perfection by Alakina Mann) and Grace frantically opening and closing doors. Then doors open by themselves, curtains, once drawn, are oddly pulled back with no one in the room to do so, Grace and her kids (mostly the daughter) start hearing weird noises that seem to indicate the presence of others in the house. Ghosts? Maybe, but Grace will hear none of that nonsense. She just keeps telling her kids to shut up and stop lying to her about the noises.

What follows is a series of shocks and scares, directed to make you jump right into the arms of the person sitting in front of you. If the guy in front of me wasn't so tall, I probably would have. Instead, I found myself clutching the arm of my seat so tight that, toward the end, I thought I'd rip it right off!

As for Nicole, she's one of those hit-or-miss actresses, electrifying in some roles ("To Die For" was brilliant), but wasted in others ("Batman & Robin"). Yet, she hits the bulls-eye in this one! Conveying fear and dread with acute accuracy and truth. She's a real pleasure to watch here. Her statuesque beauty and icy intensity suit the film perfectly. Her performance only heightens the ominous tone of the picture.

The film is a welcome throwback to a time where special effects and huge budgets were not needed to create a downright chilly horror movie. Quite frankly, my generation (we are in our mid-20's) has never had such an effective, major studio released, haunted house movie thus far: what? "The Haunting" (dismal); "House on Haunted Hill"? (stupid). Finally, a fresh, frightening and genuinely scary movie for those (like myself) reared on big "event" movies that never delivered the goods. I mean, Hollywood was in such a horror movie funk after "Scream" and its various , less entertaining knock-offs, that they had to re-release a classic like "The Exorcist" and dress it up with new sound design to make us think they still knew how to make horror movies!! Thankfully, here we are treated to a truly scary movie, one without bloody deaths and stupid teenagers being hacked to pieces. Let there be no mistake, I am always up for a good slice-em-up movie, but this is an intelligent and well-crafted fright-fest, fashioned to shock the hell out of young and old alike. See it in a dark theater or in your living room with all of the lights off, and those creaks you hear in the middle of the night will certainly make you pull the covers up tight. Break out those night-lights, you're gonna need them!!