The Innocents (1961) - film review

In Victorian England, Miss Giddens accepts the position of a governess to two young children living in a luxurious country estate.  When she first meets the children, Miles and Flora, they appear to be the model of innocence, but, on learning that Miles was expelled from school, Miss Giddens soon begins to suspect that something is terribly wrong.  The housekeeper Mrs Grose reveals that the children may have been influenced by their previous governess, Miss Jessel, and her violent lover, Mr Quint, who both died the previous year in mysterious circumstances.    Having seen what she believes to be the ghosts of Miss Jessel and Mr Quint, Miss Giddens becomes convinced that their spirits have taken possession of the two children.  She takes it upon herself to save the children before it is too late…

After winning international acclaim for his groundbreaking social realist drama Room at the Top, British director Jack Clayton went on to make what many consider to be one of the greatest supernatural thrillers of them all, The Innocents.  Closely based on Henry James’ novel "The Turn of the Screw", the film skilfully draws its spectator into a dreamlike Gothic fantasy world and then proceeds to shock the life out of him or her through a combination of sublime acting and hugely inventive camerawork – all shot in glorious black-and-white.  A marvellously restrained performance from Deborah Kerr is narrowly eclipsed by the contribution from her two young co-stars Martin Stephens and Pamela Franklin, who are mesmerising (but utterly terrifying) as the all-too-angelic Miles and Flora.

The beauty of this film lies in its simplicity and in the way it manages to sustain the tension and the ambiguity right up until the final frame.   Whilst the harrowing, heart-stopping climax provides a more than satisfactory end to the drama, we are still none the wiser. Who can tell whether the children really were possessed or whether the ghosts were merely the figment of Miss Giddens’ diseased imagination?  It is left to the spectator to draw his own conclusions and ponder on the true significance of the film’s enigmatic title.

© James Travers 2003

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