Intelligent, Tender and Refreshing

Rating: Null/10 (4 December 2001)

A beautifully constructed film, which relies on suspense and psychological inference to convey its romantic brand of terror. There is no question that there is Hitchcock here, but so to are there influences from the 1940's 'Gaslight' and a host of other romantic ghost stories from this era.
The film is as much a tragedy as it is wilfully frightening and Kidman's isolation and despair whose only respite is her desperate adherence to strict religious piety is powerful and heart wrenching.
Emotional turmoil and spiritual awakening have always complimented each other well but here the relationship between them is pulled off with great originality and flair.
Strong performances all round pull this essentially simple film (note the short credits to cast and crew at the end) up a level and certainly make it a contender for one of these years' best films.
In the 1940's directors relied on the psychology of fear tapping into the emotions and often-subconscious fear of an apparently fast secularising society. The loosening of censorship guidelines brought us the Hammer genre of increasing gore and a sexual dimension. Sadly the mixture of psychology and gore which peaked in the mid 1970's deteriorated so that by the 1980's we were treated to a blood bath which was disturbing but quite frankly cheap, vacuous and most of all not very scary. The postmodern outlook of Wes Craven was certainly refreshing but The Others like 6th Sense resurrects a genre where fear and emotion intertwine. Where impact is complex and haunting for loss of a better word. Rightly so, the modern cinemagoer is both educated and complex something which Hollywood would do well to understand and in this case has. Cool, intelligent, thought provoking and tender The Others is a fine attempt at resuscitating the golden age of the romantic ghost story.