The Others- 2001

During world war II Grace (Nicole Kidman) and her two children Anne and Nicholas move to the English Coast, she awaits word from her husband who is MIA and remains huddled in the house with her two children who have a rare disease

which causes the sun to harm them.

The movie directed by Alejandro

Amenabar showed us that large budgets are not needed to make horror movies scary or great any more. This movie doesn't have any particularly gory events and relies solely on suspense and mystery to create an eerie atmosphere throughout the film, using pathetic fallacy particularly the fog which indicates that things aren't clear and also isolates the family from civilisation. 

                                              

When Anne starts to disclose to her mother that she has been communicating with a presence within the house she is quickly dismissed and pushed aside by her mother Grace but eventually throughout the film cannot deny that there must be Others (pun intended) in the house.

One crucial scene that represents this revelation is called Strange Voices. Grace hears suspicious noises behind a door and enters the room. The room is filled with furniture covered with white sheets, as Grace stumbles her way through them a silence full of suspense plays throughout the room and all you can hear is the creak of the floorboards with each step. The camera zooms into Grace's face into a close up shot and rotates around her head, when the back of her head is on display you hear whispers around the room and then one voice goes "shhh". The voices built up suspense to a short silence, when suddenly something is dropped Grace leaps away in fear and runs into one a mannequin, she then starts tearing the sheets off of the furniture frantically when she tears the sheet off the mirror you see the door and the camera slowly zooms in closer to Grace's reflection whilst the door is still in view it then switches suddenly you don't see the door shut but you hear it close and Grace runs out of it seeking out the intruders.

The white cloaks covering the furniture hints at the plot twist, she is amongst many things that she is unable to see but they are real like the furniture is physically their so are the people who live there.

    Towards the end of the film we make a revelation, that in fact Grace's house is not haunted, we discover she was a psychopath who murdered both of her children, and their dead spirits live on in the house and the only ghosts within the house are her and her children and the staff that live with her.

The film wasn't your typical modern horror film, it was set in a realistic setting at the time, it didn't rely on thing's such as blood and gory and the "shock factor" of vivid deaths it's simplicity and elegant execution on how to make an eerie film along with an unexpected plot twist is what makes it great.