the audience applauded

So much average

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Feels like a ghost story. Cameo appearances of ghostly apparitions, draw on the viewer's attention.The film definitely plays out as a psychological thriller. The artifacts stowed in the old attic: the life- sized dummy, the music box- aid in supporting the ghost story setting.The acting is decent. the gathered talent, they work well off of each other.The children seem to be the catalyst of the haunting; making for an interesting twist.The movie, is based on a well written story; that has the feel of a classic ghost tale.Fans of ghost story novels and films; will enjoy this movie.With very few modern ghost stories filming today, I believe the movie: The Innocents; is worth a look, for possibility of a remake.

My sister took me at about ten years of age to see this as a play on Broadway, starring Beatrice Straight. I'm certain that she could not have been aware of how frightening this play would be for a ten year old. In plain words, it scared the be jabbers out of me. I was leery of being alone in a darkened apartment for years afterward. We can now jump forward a bunch of years to the winter of 1961. By this time, I was married and in the service. I was still in training , in Army Administration School at Ft Jackson, SC. since this was a Training Base, it emptied out during the Christmas Holiday, and most of us went home for the ten days between Christmas and New Years. I hadn't been able to see my new wife for six weeks, so I got myself home ASAP. WE went to several first run films, while we relaxed for the time I was home. One was THE INNOCENTS, now starring Miss Kerr and Michael Redgrave. Even though I was an adult and in the army, the story and characters had lost none of it power to still scare the be jabbers out of me. This film has been shown uncut on several cable channels and TMC and I never could bring myself to watch it again. It's still SCARY, SCARY, THE SCARIEST to me. There have only been two films in my close to eighty years that have affected me in this manner. THE INNOCENTS and HITCHCOCK'S masterwork, PSYCHO. If you do not wish the be jabbers scared out of you. stay away from these two films.

..to modify Clint Eastwood's time honored line. A film adaptation of "The Turn of the Screw", this is the story of a governess, Miss Giddens (Deborah Kerr), hired to look after the orphaned niece and nephew of a wealthy man. He has had custody of them since infancy, and simply can't be bothered to be a parent to them. He thus gives Miss Giddens complete authority over the children and the household of the country estate where they live. Soon though, Miss Giddens realizes that there are ghosts in the house - two to be exact. The housekeeper tells her of Quint and Miss Giddens' predecessor, Miss Jessel, who had an indiscreet affair with Quint, also an employee in the household. Quint died, and Miss Jessel drowned herself in her grief. This film is in the same league as "The Haunting" in that you don't actually see that much. The suspense is in the music, cinematography, and atmosphere as a whole. There are a few reflections of the ghosts in windows and one very creepy scene by the lake, the one scene that has stayed with me since I saw this one as a child. Giddens' interest is in protecting the children, but she is a bit dithery, a touch unbalanced, and maybe not too bright. She makes up her mind that the ghosts are possessing the children,seems to be making up what she has to do to rid the children of the ghosts, and in fact she seems to be making up all of what has to be done as she goes along. She never stops to think what powers the ghosts might possess, and her decision to charge full speed ahead at exorcising them leads to a bad outcome, one in which she seems genuinely surprised.All of this I have just mentioned is why I truly think that The Innocents is Deborah Kerr's finest moment , she pulls off depicting this (at times) irritating and possibly daft and certainly hysterical and unhinged woman so well that I still liked her; and I was touched at the end by her pain instead of being angry with her for "causing" the bad outcome of the exorcism. It's a standard Kerr role, with touches of her various nuns, governesses and stuffy Brits from earlier films, so her seeming effortlessness in the part is an explainable plus, but in The Innocents she really reaches inside and pulls out something deeper to show us that her every moment is genuine.The children were absolutely perfect in their roles, which begs the question why was Pamela Frankin, who played the female child here, put in so many horror roles? Meg Jenkins plays it docile and down to earth as the housekeeper who befriends Giddens. You can tell she thinks the woman is daft, even though she has heard and seen things that make her believe that Quint and Miss Jessel are still "around" in some way. She tries to give Giddens some of her wisdom from a lifetime of taking care of children, but when her ideas are dismissed, in the end she just follows orders like the servant she's always been.

1 of the most wonderful movie I've ever see...worth watching again, I am going to review this movie on psychological basis, which I believe it is and going a little deeper but not too far. This movie depicts a timeless problems of parents-child relationship and how you should grow your child without fear specially the fear of the God, Satan and related topics, and obviously when love becomes obsession how darkness arrive at the door of happiness do his duty by the help of peoples innocence. A victim child of believing god n devil by the religious conviction inherited by her parents (she mentioned dad but I believe both) and after growing up then becoming a governess who is really naive on her core, and find motherly love on these rather mature & talented children, who saw the reality by who knows may be the Satan. It shows logical contradiction if you try to differentiate so called God from one of his part the Satan, and both serves quite the same purpose or duty to the innocents, perhaps it is Swami Vivekananda's vision, and he is very right, once he said about a religious book that, it is better to play football than to read that holy book. I believe he was trying to say that you must maturely handle or read the book (the holy one) or not read it at all. I would say on the same tone that : it's better to have faith in a Dog than to the so called God/Satan. what? feels offensive enough well you should be, because that's the evidence suggests that's the reality we live in, I just remember 'Robin Hardy's film called the 'Wicker Man' 1973, its a great one. But to conclude about this movie, it's a wonderful story, even without its clear 'shining' of 'The Massacre of The Innocents' and the two paintings of Peter Paul Rubens on this subject. The best British horror film I've ever seen! Thank you!!!