Clever, chilling, provocative.

Rating: Null/10 (13 December 2001)

Oooooh, scary movie? Well, not in the vein of, say, "Carrie" or "Halloween". (Scary gore-fests are a bit passé, aren't they?) No, this is an intelligent ghost story. The premise is not an original idea, but it's extremely well presented. Nicole Kidman turns in another effortless excellent performance without outshining her fellow actors, so we also get the full benefit of the fine contributions from unknowns (at least to me) Fionnula Flanagan as the housekeeper and Alakina Mann and James Bentley as Kidman's character's children. After seeing the faithful -but-tedious "Potty Harry", it's very refreshing to see child actors doing their job really convincingly and movingly. Meanwhile Eric Sykes as the gardener brings just the right combination of gravitas and "Ho ho, I know what's going on and you don't".
The direction is mostly subtly effective, and very occasionally not-so-subtly effective, in particular during the "Oh so *that's* what's going on" pharyngoedema[1]-inducing scene near the end.
Most of the time this film rolls along nicely at 8/10, but it briefly hits 10/10 with the afore-mentioned revelatory scene so I'm prepared to overlook the utter implausiblity of the premise and give it 8.5/10. Not an absolute must-see but definitely a pleasure to have watched it.
[1]: a made-up term meaning approximately "lump-in-the-throat"