The Others: DVD, Blu-ray Movie Review (2009)

Editor's Note: Halloween is nearly upon us. So, over the next 8 days--or, as we'll call them here, "Week in Rewind's 8 Days of Horror"--we'll offer up reviews of some great horror movies you might want to consider for the big day.

First up was Let the Right One In? Second up? The Others.

Written and directed by Alejandro Amenabar, 104 minutes, rated PG-13.

Alejandro Amenabar’s The Others stars Nicole Kidman as Grace, a gorgeous young aristocrat reminiscent of Grace Kelly who’s living alone with her two children in a sprawling Victorian mansion on the British Isle of Jersey.

The year is 1945, Grace’s husband (Christopher Eccleston) hasn’t returned from World War II and is feared dead, and her children, Anne (Alakina Mann) and Nicholas (James Bentley), are suffering from a disease that makes them fatally susceptible to light.

Fastidious and grim, her lean body sewn tightly into haute couture, Grace keeps the mansion in almost total darkness, shutting out the daylight by blocking the windows with heavy curtains, and protecting her children by locking them away in one of the mansion’s 50 shadowy rooms. It’s a wonderful set-up for the macabre, but one whose success demands that little more be revealed here.

Recalling Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, Peter Medak’s The Changeling and M. Night Shyamalan’s The Sixth Sense, “The Others” is an old fashioned ghost story that understands the conventions of the genre and uses them well. It doesn’t rely on cheap thrills to generate tension and fear--its utter lack of special effects is one of its greatest strengths--but its ability to surprise will depend on the level of its audience’s sophistication.

Indeed, there will be those who will delight in Amenabar’s ending, and others who will see it coming long before the final reel. One of the marks of a great horror film is its ability to keep everyone guessing. As good as “The Others” is, it falls short of that.

Grade: B+