This weekend, eclectic indie filmmaker David Lowery‘s quirky “A Ghost Story” will start heading into cinemas. Starring Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck, “A Ghost Story,” shouldn’t work. A moving and existential movie about longing, love, sadness and the immensity of time, it’s about a man that dies, but lingers as an apparition as his wife eventually moves on with her life. But it’s a movie where the ghost is simply a white sheet over Casey Affleck’s head, but nonetheless, the experience is still deeply emotional and profound, creating a spellbinding picture about loss told from the point of view of silent, motionless ghost.
In short, “A Ghost Story,” is one of the best movies of the year (here’s our review) and furthers the case for Lowery as one of the shining new lights of cinema. Reflecting on this affecting narrative about spirits and the echoes that haunt our lives, we thought this was a perfect time to explore and meditate on the ghost story genre, one that is broader than you might think and deeply rich in human texture. Disturbed by these films in the best possible way, we decided to look at a hopefully diverse group of ghost movies that at their core express an emotional core that often goes much further than just frights and terror, while never forgetting their fundamental unsettling foundations.
“The Others” (2001)
Who are the ghosts and who are the living? That’s the question to be answered in Alejandro Amenabar’s gothic horror tale “The Others,” a taut psychological thriller that proved not all things that go bump in the night need elaborate special effects to chill audiences to the bone when it was released over fifteen years ago. Set in a dim mansion on the English coast toward the end of World War II, this suspenseful slow burn is a masterclass in mood and setting, pulling heavily from the fabric of “The Innocents” directed by Jack Clayton. But “The Others” stands confidently on its own, gradually removing the rug out from under us with a jaw-dropping third act twist that only enhances repeat viewings. Nicole Kidman’s stellar performance as a tightly wound matriarch who unravels along with the protected existence she’s carefully crafted for her two children afflicted with an allergy to direct sunlight helps elevate “The Others” to one of the best ghost stories of the 21st century.
“Beloved” (1998)
It has never been a better time to revisit Jonathan Demme’s “Beloved.” An underrated and respectful (to its benefit) adaptation of the Toni Morrison-penned literary masterpiece, Demme’s iteration advantageously uses visuals to translate the permanent, lingering effects of slavery to the screen. With an almost three-hour long runtime and some difficult subject matter, it definitely tests both its audience’s patience and stomach for misery, but not without reward. It does not forget the humanity of good people as moments of beauty are salvaged amongst a time of deep hatred, and all the more powerful because of it. Performances by Oprah Winfrey, Kimberly Elise, and Danny Glover exude a terrible desperation, while Thandie Newton, as the physical manifestation of the murdered Beloved grown from a tree, permanently baby-like, is terrifying, yet pitiful. Newton is the only literal ghost, but the film, with a very spiritual manner, constantly reminds of the other casualties of such a period of injustice — the ghosts of memory, the revenge of history.
“Hausu” (1977)
Every genre needs their “Gremlins 2”—a batshit crazy film that goes off the rails, defies every element of that genre and is generally just off the walls (and placed high on our Best Foreign Horrors Ever list). That’s Nobuhiko Obayashi’s bonkers “Hausu,” a horror/comedy ghost story and haunted house tale about a gaggle schoolgirls on their way to an aunt’s haunted country home—a domicile that tries to devour the girls in bizarre, gruesome and perhaps unintentionally comedic ways. Hilariously, Obayashi was tasked by Toho studios to make a movie like “Jaws,” and of course that was lost in translation and or it came out hilariously wrong. Absurdist and nearly psychedelic, “Hausu” is a phantasmagorical treat for horror/ghost lovers that need a laugh and want to marvel at something just fantastically nonsensical.
“The Innocents” (1961)
Set in a big old, country mansion with an ominous and puzzling aura, Director Jack Clayton’s ‘The Innocents’ follows the uneasy story of a governess (Deborah Kerr) looking after two increasingly fiendish children whose behavior grows into something entirely unsettling as the storyline progresses. Through the governess’s maniacal eyes, a subtle mystery of ghosts and/or insanity reveals itself, deterring upon a blurred line that lodges the viewer thick in darkness alongside Kerr’s perturbed character, Miss Giddens. While the film’s scares are blatant, front-and-center, Clayton never provides a definitive answer to whether the ghostly images are tangible or an example of liberated psychosis. Even though much of the dread in this classic lies within the ambiguity of what is or isn’t there, there are overpowering, bone-chilling moments fuming from the film’s child actors. It seems as if horror movies with possessed children are always the most frightening; here, these two deceiving “angels” possess a sadistic tinge draping their soft faces. “The Innocents” extracts the pristine nature of adolescence with a dismantling tool of scare, exposing the porous barrier between innocence and horror through these two cryptic children. With a clear-cut influence on “The Others,” this hair-raising adaptation of Henry James‘ novella “The Turning of the Screw” is an imperative classic with a disturbing touch of lunacy.
“Ugetsu” (1953)
The Japanese love their ghost stories centering on dead lovers and Kenji Mizoguchi’s “Ugetsu” pitches itself dead center in that lane. A romantic supernatural jidaigeki period drama set in the Edo Japanese civil war era, “Ugetsu” is the type of apparition movie far less concerned with frights as it is longing. Eerie and gorgeous, a tragic tale about the folly of ambition, “Ugetsu” centers on a peasant farmer turned soldier who abandons his wife and child during the civil war only to be seduced by a wicked spirit. An integral subplot underlining the movie’s theme centers on would-be samurai dreaming about greatness who achieves his goals at the expense of his own wife. Quietly moving, the hallmark of Mizoguchi’s understated, but affecting style, “Ugetsu,” for all its fantastical and unnerving qualities, is ultimately a profound humanist drama about the foolhardiness of man that is both spooky and heartbreaking in equal measure.