“The Others” film. For those that believe …

[NotSoSlimShadee]

It’s an old film but SPOILERS will be included here!

I’m an open minded sceptic but I’d like to believe. I watched “The Others” many years ago and it really made me think - if ghosts are real - AIBU to think “The Others” is probably the most likely scenario in how they exist?

Going about their lives completely unaware that they’re dead? Unable (normally) to detect the living? Invisible (normally) to the living? And sometimes the two worlds cross slightly so the two become aware of each other?

I know it’s an old film but it’s one of my favourites and really made me think about the possibilities of the paranormal.

No need to reply with “ghosts aren’t real”

But how would that work? Surely they’d notice eventually that they never got old? What happens when they go to work, or the pub? Where do they think their friends have gone? I’ve seen the film, years ago, and don’t remember the details.

Well in the film she can’t leave the house because of the fog. The kids can’t go out anyway as they’re allergic to sunlight and she has no friends. Thinking about it - the set up is pretty convenient 😂

I like Ghosts version of ghost life better (BBC or USA version). Most of them can't travel, either.

In The Others the mother is unaware that she killed her children then herself but her daughter at least knows her mum killed them doesn't she.

So it seems unfair that the woman is a ghost and can't move on because she blanked out the truth, but why are her children also stuck here, why are some servants also stuck and why don't they all "move on" once she realises and acknowledges that she killed them?

Unless they’re not….perhaps they are the versions that exist in her purgatory and the children’s souls did cross over at the time of death. Idk, lol!

That film really got to me too. We live in a large Victorian house and I remember coming home late from seeing it with my DH when our DCs were around the same age as the characters, and looking out the window the way NK does at the end and asking DH if he thinks we’ll be the same…”We will always live here…” etc. So haunting and thought provoking.

It’s a fabulous film, and less harrowing than The Orphanage (have you seen that? It haunted me for a long while).
Aren't ghosts essentially trapped spirits, so trapped by their own demise or wrong doing or whatever and in that way she only exists on repeat, so never questions time not moving on. She and the kids are on a loop almost. A punishment loop!

Brilliant film!!! And Christopher Eccleston character fab. That bit whete she is undressing in the bedroom and CE asks her about it... she knows what happened... just didn't want to acknowledge it. I do think the little boy knows as well, just more in denial than the girl.

Glad this was brought up actually. I've watched it several times and I SWEAR that at the end when the the servants are chinning to the door after the children have found the graves, they come through the locked door. DS and I recently watched it and they didn't. He and I are both certain this happened, anyone else?

Yes!! Like you I’ve watched it many times and the last time I watched it I was so sure they walked through the locked door but on this occasion they didn’t.

Also, I’m pretty sure that when the woman is talking to her husband in the bedroom he didn’t have a reflection in the mirror. I always thought that was the first clue - but on this occasion there was a reflection! Made me question my own memory!

I think it is an excellent film! The first time I saw it I was fascinated by the twist at the end. Also liked the fact that Eric Sykes was in it, and that it was set in Jersey during the war (I lived in the Channel Islands at one stage).

@NotSoSlimShadee yes!!!!!! You are definitely right about the reflection. So glad I am not going mad about the doors!

I always thought he was a ghost. Just hadn’t realised that they all were. How had she killed the children, I can’t remember?

I just watched that film again and absolutely love it. It's so well done and one of the best spooky films, for me. I didn't see the ending coming AT ALL the first time I saw it.

I am a sceptic but love time slips, time travel, ghost stories and the idea of people carrying on in their own time and different time periods overlapping.

Think she suffocated them. That bit where the servants walk out of the mist towards them- so scary!

Suffocation with a pillow I think.

That little boy actor is up there with Haley Jo Osment at looking convincingly terrified. I felt for the kids so much in both films.

Nicole Kidman is absolutely brilliant at that brittle, scary type.

I have to watch The Hours again too.

I'm inclined to agree... if you know about the ghost sightings in York you'll know that an entire roman legion was seen walking through a cellar looking like they were coming back from a hard fought battle.... then the road was actually found below the cellar so it's feasible there was that energy there.... but if that's the case do they just relive parts of their lives over and over or is it just an imprint of spiritual electricity that remains rather than the counciousness of a ghost. !??!? Sorry too scientific (ish... I mean I know its not really science) to marry up with the film the others.

@MaggieBsBoat agree with you (and also agree about The Orphanage, which completely messed with my head for months).

I think it also indicates how we can all become trapped in our little loops, given that we're always the least reliable narrators of our own stories.

It's like the parable of the blind men and the elephant.

Maybe ghosts can exist in such circumstances - I wouldn't rule it out. Living people most certainly can.

I was in a screen test for one of the endings.

It was the eeriest thing at the end of the film. There was no noise from anyone, and it had been a full room.
We all just filed out silently.

What I like about The Others is that the only thing is has is atmosphere and a bloody brilliant story. There is no gore, no monsters, no visible ghosts even (well, there is obviously but you just don’t know it). It’s so subtle and fantastic writing. I love films like this but they’re so rare. I’m a horror fan but it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a horror film I actually liked. All you get these days is cardboard cutout teenagers, an OTT storyline and lots of blood and guts. To me - the sign of a good writer is one that doesn’t need to rely on visuals.

The 6th Sense was another good one.

Which “Orphanage” film are we talking about? I’ve just searched for a trailer and there are many films of the same name

it's such a brilliant film and so terrifying, especially as it was a PG!

Spanish one from 2007. Search for El Orfanato. Or, don't, because it will fuck you up, seriously. It's not gory or anything, just devastating.

Sounds just like my cup of tea! Is it subtitled or dubbed?

Can be either depending on where you find it.

Here it's subtitled. Now, don't say I didn't warn you :

https://www.bilibili.tv/en/video/2046082237 www.bilibili.tv/en/video/2046082237]]]]