#2 The Others

Overview:  Grace Stewart and her two nearly albino kids have been having some poopy times ever since the father headed off to Europe, and to make matters worse their servants have deserted the house.  Due to the kid's light allergy (XP), the family had developed a gnarly version of cabin fever, so they're brains are about to crack like Roman Polanski's career.  Things become a little easier when three people knock on their door and claim to be their new servants, but are they all that they seem?

The Good:  I have a good connection with this movie, because just like the kids, my skin is extremely sensitive to the sun, and by being in the sun for roughly 5 minutes I start baking and shriveling like bacon on a Saturday morning.  For a haunted house movie this one hits all the right notes, and it does it absolutely perfectly.  In terms of being scary "The Others" is not as frightening as "Insidious", but it's far more clever and all around better made.  What sets this movie apart is it's very old fashioned appeal.  We are used to Horror movies being jazzed up the ying-yang with special effects, and when a fright-flick doesn't have those effects, then it almost has no appeal.  "The Others" succeeds in using old fashioned scares, so instead of using ANY special effects, it uses silence to draw the viewer in and play with the mind.  Nicole Kidman and her two kids are extremely convincing characters, and they actually make you feel their dread with them; by the end of the movie I had so much cabin fever that I felt like staring into a cooking microwave just for fun... maybe I should get myself checked.

The Bad:  besides the fact that the two kids in the movie look like one of the cast members from "The Children of the Corn", there isn't much about this movie that makes me want to use the bathroom.  There was an experience I had when watching this for the first time that made me mad though.  Me and a group of friends gathered together in a large TV room and we decided to watch said movie, and during the scariest part of the movie he gave me a spook by grabbing me and yelling "GHOST!"  I hope the steak we had that night went rancid in his stomach and that he now has a severe case of IBS!!  Was that a little harsh? My therapist said it's good to release steam.

The Ugly:  This is THE perfect haunted house movie, and if you are a fan of those types of films, then this one is right up your alley... if you have one.  Just make sure that when you watch it you don't have anyone sitting directly behind you, because it makes you the perfect target and they will pounce on you, like a lion does to a useless wildebeest.  

5 out of 5