This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

A creepy, captivating & chilling British horror that still packs enough power to scare, startle & surprise its audience after all these years, The Innocents is an ingeniously crafted example of its genre that makes impressive use of its remote setting & eerie atmosphere to deliver a tense, taut & thrilling experience, and thanks to the fine line it walks between supernatural & psychological horror, it continues to be a subject of discussion amongst film buffs even today.

Truly one of the most terrifying and sophisticated ghost stories of all time, the work of a master story-teller. Truman Capote was central to the screenplay and he unequivocally asserted the reality of the ghosts. It has been fashionable for years to make the story a demented hallucination of the sexually repressed governess. 1) The expulsion of Miles from school is the linchpin of the whole sewer of corruption emanating from the ghosts. Both novel and film clearly insinuate that Miles has been corrupting his classmates in some unspeakable way. What else could be the source of this evil in the angelic Miles than the ghosts? 2) In both book and film the governess recognizes the ghosts - people she has never known or seen and who are dead as is affirmed by the housekeeper. Even if you narrow it down to incidents that are both in the book and film, there are other examples as well of the reality of the ghosts. The susceptibility of the governess to being haunted is another question entirely. James has spoken how the real terror of ghosts is best evoked by showing the effects on those being haunted, not a lot of overblown effects. Recent books and film both need to remember this.

THE INNOCENTS is a supernatural Gothic horror about a governess who watches over two children and comes to fear that their house is haunted by ghosts.The young and beautiful Miss Giddens applies for a job as a governess. A wealthy bachelor thinks, regardless of her inexperience, that she is an ideal for his niece and nephew. He travels frequently and does not have time for his small relatives. She accepts full responsibility for the children. Previous governess is suddenly died. New governess has found a decent and friendly girl and later, a charming and flattering boy. However, children are hiding some strange secrets. Miss Giddens is upset by unexplained voices and by several visions of a woman and man...Psychology and an eerie atmosphere, through a strange combination of a supernatural and traditional work very well. Close-ups between apparitions and emotions, with change of soundtracks are almost perfect.Deborah Kerr (Miss Giddens) is an extremely complex character, who quickly accepts anomalous situations and at the same time struggling with her own hallucinations and sexual frustrations. However, it is not a dark or irrational character. She is an entirely healthy woman, who is faced with a mystery of the past and ghostly appearances. We, actually, look the events through her eyes.Mr. Clayton has successfully set a trap. Ms. Kerr has offered great performance.Martin Stephens (Miles) and Pamela Franklin (Flora) are the core of the problem as innocent and sinister children at the same time. However, they are, in fact, confused.Are innocent children possessed and thrown into a vortex of perverse sexual secrets or are they victims of a morbid young woman who has a lush imagination and perverse sexual desire!? Decide for yourself.

Like THE HAUNTING, this is a slow-moving and subtle film which manages to evoke a true sense of fear with the viewer. Easily the definitive version of Henry James' novel THE TURN OF THE SCREW, this is an intelligent, gripping horror film which gives us time to get to know the principal characters before dropping them in at the deep end. Indeed, the first half an hour is quite hard to sit through as nothing particularly happens, and the characters are merely introduced, but things soon become unbearably spooky and surprisingly dark before the downbeat conclusion. This is frightening, adult cinema, and not a film for those with nervous dispositions.Unlike THE HAUNTING, we do actually get to see the ghosts here - albeit briefly. They take the form of normal-looking people, not bloody or gory, standing silently, watching. These are scary apparitions, and I think ghosts in films are more effective when they don't actually do much except stand around and look scary - there's something understated about them which adds to their creepiness, as if they are like statues (for another great example of these silent spectres, check out ENDLESS NIGHT, which has a really frightening moment towards the end).The acting is excellent, especially from Deborah Kerr as the haunted governess who is not afraid to believe in the spirit world and remains refreshingly open-minded; I for one am sick of principal characters disbelieving ghosts and having to be convinced in films. Kerr gets to display a range of emotions here; love, compassion, fear and disgust, making her performance really good in my eye. However, the acting of Martin Stephens and Pamela Franklin surpass even Kerr's performance - Stephens and Franklin being a pair of very creepy kids. On the outside they're polite and respectable, but you just know that there's a dark and deadly secret waiting to burst out at any moment. Franklin descends into incoherent screaming at the end of the film, while Stephens you may recognise (with blond hair this time) from his equally menacing role in VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED. Megs Jenkins and Michael Redgrave also do quite well with their underdeveloped housemaid and 'Uncle' characters respectively.Freddie Francis was on hand to perform some nice crisp photography, and it shows, as the film is beautifully filmed. It also isn't afraid to leave some loose ends and also have a surprisingly tragic finale - one which is totally unexpected. This is an unnerving, classy haunting film which easily achieves what it sets out to do.