The Others (2001)
Nicole Kidman delivers yet another arresting performance as Grace, a buttoned-up, devout mother who will do anything to protect her pale, delicate children with a rare condition that makes exposure to the sunlight painful. This means that the inside of the stately Gothic estate on the English countryside is cloaked in shadow and lit by candlelight throughout the film, which only heightens the tension of the ghostly happenings such as a piano playing by itself or doorknobs randomly jiggling.
One of the most terrifying scenes is when Grace finds an elderly woman wearing her daughter’s communion dress and playing with puppets but speaking in her little voice. There’s an antiquated eeriness to The Others in the depictions of seances and nineteenth-century photographs of corpses, all building to a surprising twist ending that completely turns the haunted house genre on its head.
