The Others 4K

The Others
4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray
Criterion
2001 / 104 Min. / 1.85.1
Starring Nicole Kidman, Fionnula Flanagan, Alakina Mann, James Bentley
Written by Alejandro Amenábar
Photographed by Javier Aguirresarobe
Directed by Alejandro Amenábar

If it’s possible for one movie to haunt another, then surely the spirit of Jack Clayton’s The Innocents walks alongside Alejandro Amenábar’s The Others. The story of a star-crossed governess and two possibly possessed siblings, Clayton’s 1961 classic drew the blueprint for Amenábar’s own bleak house.

While both films are more concerned with demons of the mind than the concrete variety, neither director is above an old-fashioned fun-house scare. But The Others is no joyride, it’s a Shakespearean tragedy told in the form of a campfire tale. Nicole Kidman plays Grace Stewart, a war widow who resides off the coast of France on the isle of Jersey with her two small children, Anne and Nicholas. The kids’ fantasy lives are more active than most; they have a clinical aversion to light which demands that the curtains in their water-locked home be closed at all times. Living in darkness on a remote island can play havoc with your imagination and Grace’s children are no different. They’re seeing ghosts.

The new housekeepers, a nanny named Bertha Mills, a gardener named Edmund, and a silent chambermaid named Lydia, are lifelong career servants but still intimidated by Grace whose icy demeanor does nothing to warm this chilly house. The trio only speaks when spoken to and so have an unofficial spokeswoman in Mrs. Mills, a gentle woman with a Dublin lilt and a reliable bedside manner. Regarding the ghosts that supposedly haunt the hallways, Mrs. Mills is fatalistic—”there isn’t always an answer for everything.” But she’s being coy, in this case, she knows there is.

If The Innocents had been photographed in color, this is what it would have looked like, a blend of solemn brown and black submerged in inky shadows. The people in this movie are forever emerging from and retreating into the darkness and that is how we meet Anne and Nicholas; “I want you to meet the children” announces Grace and suddenly, as if she was performing a magic trick, there they are. Anne is the first to recognize the presence of invisible “intruders” as her mother calls them. And it’s not till her daughter is possessed by a white-haired banshee that Grace begins to change her tune.

Until that particularly unnerving moment, those intruders had been content to open doors, bang on the floors and tickle the piano keys. But their antics, which once could have been perceived as playful, take an alarming and potentially murderous turn; one afternoon they steal the heavy drapes from all the windows, exposing the children to the deadly sunlight. It’s enough to make Grace take up arms, but the discovery of three tombstones on her property makes her consider things in a new light. Bertha had promised Anne “big surprises” and she does not disappoint.

Though more intruders are sure to come, there is a happy ending of sorts; after some unusually intense soul-searching the Stewarts have a better understanding of themselves, and a new lease on life—even if that life isn’t their own.

Nicole Kidman may be the most fashionable anti-heroine in movie history. As Grace she wears a variety of severely sexy uniforms designed by the perfectly named Sonia Grande whose creations are both form-fitting and indicative of Grace’s tightly-wrapped character. The actress is stunning on several levels, a clotheshorse for the ages. To be clear, the whole movie looks great, Javier Aguirresarobe’s cinematography is a tour de force, and Amenábar pulls off a trifecta in winning fashion; director, screenwriter, and composer.

When the movie was produced Amenábar spoke little to no English which makes the fine performances he captured seem like little miracles, in particular the great Irish actress and playwright Fionnula Flanagan as Bertha—those who’ve seen her one-woman James Joyce’s Women know she is fearless so she’s just the person to have by your side in a haunted house. By her side is another fine Irish actress, Elaine Cassidy as the mute Lydia, and the wonderful British writer/actor Eric Sykes as Edmund Tuttle. Two other little miracles are 11-year-old Alakina Mann and 9-year-old James Bentley as Anne and Nicholas—if they’re possessed, it’s by the spirits of Pamela Franklin and Martin Stephens, the cursed children of The Innocents—they’re superb, as only the most intuitive of child actors can be.

A movie this gorgeous deserves the best and Criterion lives up to their name with a 4K presentation that is ravisishing, even in conventional high definition. Regarding the 4K transfer, Glenn Erickson writes, “Everything in The Others is mid-channel murk and gloom, but the 4K encoding brings even the darkest corners of that house to eerie life — the added contrast range allow more shades of darkness than standard HD. The exteriors seem to take place in a partial fogbank, waiting for the sun to shine.”

Extras on the set included a new audio commentary featuring Amenábar, and a conversation between Amenábar and film critic Pau Gómez. There’s also a new program about the making of the film with valuable insights from Amenábar, Kidman and Christopher Eccleston who plays Grace’s battlescared husband. There’s also an assortment of archival material about the film’s production, soundtrack, and visual effects. Other extras include audition footage of the children. Included in the keep case is an essay by scholar Philip Horne.