The Others
All team (92)
Short description
Set on the island of Jersey shortly after the Second World War, The Others follows Grace Stewart, a devout woman raising her two young children alone in a large Victorian house while her husband is away at the front. Anne and Nicholas suffer from a rare condition that makes direct daylight dangerous to them, so the household is kept in permanent half-darkness. When three new servants arrive, they must follow strict rules, above all that no door may be opened until the previous one is closed. Strange occurrences and unsettling visions soon disrupt the order Grace has imposed, and she becomes determined to protect her children from whatever is intruding on their home.
Alejandro Amenábar wrote and directed the film, his third feature after Thesis and Open Your Eyes, and it was produced by Fernando Bovaira, José Luis Cuerda and Sunmin Park. Nicole Kidman plays Grace, with Alakina Mann and James Bentley as the children, Fionnula Flanagan as Mrs. Mills, Christopher Eccleston as Charles Stewart and Eric Sykes as Mr. Tuttle.
Made for about 17 million dollars, the film took roughly 210 million dollars worldwide. On IMDb it holds 7.6 out of 10 from around 425,000 votes, and on TMDB it also stands at 7.6 from more than 7,400 votes. A critics' rating of 7.7 from 174 reviews places it close to those audience scores, indicating broad agreement on the film's effectiveness.
What's left behind the scenes
- The disease that children suffer from does indeed exist, although it is very rare – only about a thousand people in the world are affected by it. It is called xeroderma.
- The film became the first Spanish production nominated for a Goya Award in which all dialogue is spoken in English.
- The group Venetian Snares used a sample from the film in the song “Children’s Limbo,” which was included on the album “Find Candace”.
- The film begins with the words of Nicole Kidman, whose voice comes from off-screen: “Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin.” These same words opened the British BBC radio program “Listen With Mother,” which aired from 1950 to 1982.
- Kidman asked Amenábar and the Weinstein brothers Bob and Harvey to find another actress for the role of Grace, as she found it difficult to start filming such a dark film after working on the vibrant "Moulin Rouge!" (2001).
- Alejandro Amenábar was specifically invited by actor and producer Tom Cruise to direct the film.
- Filming took place from September 30, 2000 to December 5, 2000 in the vicinity of Madrid. Additionally, some filming took place on Long Island in New York and at the Palacio De Los Hornillos estate in the city of Santander in northern Spain, which was used as the exterior of Grace's mansion.
- In "The Others", director Alejandro Amenábar has a very curious cameo – he can be seen in one of the photographs in the "book of the dead".
- The film became the last joint project of Cruise and Kidman. The week the film was released, their divorce was officially finalized.
- At the time of its release, the film became the highest-grossing film in Spain in the entire history of distribution.
- Alakina Mann and James Bentley received their roles after a lengthy casting process, which involved over 5,000 children.
- Mateo Gil, the screenwriter for Amenábar’s previous film “Open Your Eyes” (1997), also appears in the “corpse” photoshoot.
- The Australian musical group Elora Danan wrote a song about the film and named it “Thank God For Their Growth In Faith And Love” – such an inscription is visible on a board in the film’s final scene. The song was included on the debut album “We All Have Secrets”.
- The ghostly image behind Grace in one of the scenes is actually a portrait of Eduardo Noriega. Specifically, it's a part of the 1855 painting "The Wounded Cavalier" by English artist William Shakespeare Burton.
- Alejandro Amenábar wrote the screenplay in Spanish and then translated it into English.
- The version of the film's beginning shown in American cinemas is slightly longer than the DVD version. According to the filmmakers, the film was slightly trimmed because much of the beginning hinted at the plot of the film's resolution.
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