ReviewThe Turning film review: Henry James horror classic gets confusing and messy adaptation
- This update of James’s 1898 ghost novella The Turn of the Screw proves an empty film that will leave cinema-goers mystified by the end
- Despite good acting by a strong cast, director Floria Sigismondi lets things down with wayward directing
2/5 stars
This pedestrian ghost story plods along in a vaguely competent manner until a thoroughly muddled ending makes the whole experience pointless.
A contemporary update of Henry James’s 1898 ghost novella The Turn of the Screw, The Turning banishes the subtle supernatural touches of the source work but fails to replace them with any notable shocks. The result is an empty film which ends up a confusing mess.
A brief prologue shows a young woman fleeing an isolated Gothic mansion in a panic, only to be attacked by a mysterious figure when she reaches the gate. The story proper begins when former teacher Kate (Mackenzie Davis) moves into the mansion to take on the job of governess to two spooky children.
Kate’s charges are the young Flora (Brooklynn Prince from The Florida Project ) and her teenage brother Miles (Finn Wolfhard from Stranger Things), both of whom enjoy taunting her. The children’s parents are both dead, and the moody kids are looked after by the stern housekeeper Mrs Grose.
Bedtimes are particularly fraught and Kate keeps noticing creepy figures wandering around the grounds. She gradually learns that the mansion’s former horse-riding instructor met a grisly end, something which Mrs Grose says was well deserved.