Watched the movie The Innocents last night after I got bored reading Ouija Board testimonials at sometime around midnight. The thing is, it is an adaptation of Henry James' Turn of the Screw and when I read the plot summary in Wikipedia, the movie plot was close to book itself. I guess a visual representation of the movie would greatly help someone to intrepret this seriously open-ended book.
This is my interpretation: I think each of the characters had an individual malady that somehow had been mistakenly bunched together as one connecting event.
If we look at each of the characters' 'malady', we would see why the governess intertwined the supposed haunting to the children's obvious unstable state of mind.
1. The Governess (Ms.Giddens in the movie, unnamed in the book apparently)
Her assignment as the governess to the Bly House children was her first. Though dedicated and passionate, she is inexperienced and nervous. Being away from home and nervous on what kind of children she would deal with, Ms. Giddens had already shown signs of impending (great) stress. First, Mrs.Grose's casual remark about the devil got Ms.Gidden's shaken up a little. Strange, I thought. Later it is revealed that she grew up in a warm, loving house of large religious family. So remarks about the devil got her reeling a bit. She had only known love and comfort, and does not comprehend, nor acknowledge serious symptoms in children that needed intervention. It is like she unconsciously refuse to admit that her wards are pair of children with serious mental illness.
2. Miles
He came across as a charming and polite boy. But the way he speaks tells me something was off about him. At first I simply thought since he is with adult more than children his age, he adopted an adult's speech. But then his behaviour consequently rang all sorts of alarm bells. The first one was the sexually charged poem he recited during his role play with his sister. Only an educated person with a strong inclination towards literature can decipher a poem. Ms.Giddens was distressed, as she was rightfully so. Children that age shouldn't have come across poems like that and show signs of understanding the meaning behind that poem! The second one where he uses phrases like 'My Dear'. One would think he is just mimicking the high-society gentlemen he might have seen chatting with ladies but the more he shows abnormal reactions to things, the more I became suspicious. When Miles kissed the governess goodnight, right on the mouth like a freaking adult, it confirmed my suspicions that Miles was sexually abused. It could be Quint, the former handyman who used to live in the house, or someone from his school. His sexual abuse, his loneliness of having dead parents with no one to turn to but a sister and an old housekeeper who doesn't really raise them added, and turned him into one messed up little boy.
3. Flora
This girl creeped me out since the beginning. She says things that comes across as simply a child with high imagination, but if you really took her words into perspective - you would see that she was extremely lonely and extremely depressed (hints of imaginary friends imminent). There are times when she would simply tune out her surroundings and not realize if anyone is watching her. She has a tendency to stare into distance, which I suspect is a compulsive day dreaming disorder, a means of escapism from her boredom, sadness and loneliness. When Flora was staring ahead in a daydream, coincidentally straight ahead where the spirit of Ms. Jessel was standing, Ms. Giddens mistook this as Flora being "lured in" by Ms. Jessel's spirit. Which is why Flora went into a hysteria when she was broken from her daydreaming reverie and a frantic Ms. Giddens pointing towards nowhere saying her dead governess is looking at her across the lake.
4. Quint and Ms. Jessel.
These two had a complicated relationship, but well-known that they were fucking each other, often times at inappropriate times. I wanted to write them separately but figured clumping them together seems best fit. Mrs. Grose disclosed that Quint was not a good person, hinting that he had a notorious reputation and that someone as educated as Ms. Jessel had no business dallying with the likes of him. He is also revealed to be quite good-looking, which means he had used his looks to get his way. Mrs. Grose had revealed that Quint once hit Ms. Jessel across the face and the dead governess looked like she was turned on by that violence. Hinting strongly that these two odd couples engaged in S &M sex. When Ms. Giddens walked around the house inspecting its doors and and corners, she head whispers and clear moans and groans of pleasure such as "knock before you enter!", "the children!", "love me! love me!", "you're hurting me!". It is strongly implied that the children had walked-in on Ms. Jessel and Quint going at it, but Quint being a depraved sort of man, did not stop and continued having sex. S & M involves some humiliation-play, perhaps Quint 'humiliated' Ms. Jessel who was clearly naked and exposed by continuing to have sex with her while saying words like "damned hussy", "old hag" etc. We could imagine many vulgar words were
spoken during this sex act and Miles eventually picked it up. Children repeat what adult's do and say. Miles repeated these words to his friends in school causing his expulsion. In Ms. Gidden's dream sequence, there was a very brief scene of Quint leading Miles to a small room [door?], presumably to molest him. Miles did look up to Quint as a strong male parental figure, Quint being a deprived human being, took advantage of him.
At this point you might wonder, how does all these fit in the seemingly supernatural part of the story? My guess is Turn of the Screw/The Innocents was meant to be a psychological thriller with both elements molded into one, beautifully by the author. Most people are trying to clump it in either the horror genre or the psychological genre.
Quint and Ms. Jessel are roaming around the house as ghostly apparitions because it is said people who die without their wishes unfulfilled tend to roam around as spirits. Quint who died in a freak accident obviously loved his life and Ms. Jessel who mourned the sudden death of her lover, her sexual needs unfulfilled (supplies of men who consent in S&M are hard to come by in the late 1800's), eventually had rot away with despair and consequent suicide.
Coupled with Ms. Giddens' determination to protect these sad lonely children from further harm, she came to a conclusion on what best made sense to her. A pair of couple who got separated too soon from each other are trying to reconcile/rekindle their relationship by possessing the living children. This may be the truth, or maybe the ghostly couple are merely stuck in a dimension that doesn't belong to them. Ms. Giddens is also religious, which means she is inclined to believe in the supernatural and mystic, referring to the ghostly pair as 'abominations'.
The equation:
Ms. Giddens religious background + her determination to look after sad children + the children's own manifestations of their mental illness + wrong attribution of the governess of the children's mental illness as ghostly possession taking place.
It is all a big misunderstanding because Ms. Giddens used the wrong approach to tackle the obvious issue at hand - the children's unstable psychology.
This is what I mean when I said - each of the characters had an individual malady that somehow had been mistakenly bunched together as one connecting event.
BONUS: Symbolism in the movie.
1. Butterfly on Ms. Gidden's back.
Something that is free and beautiful. Ms. Giddens can be assumed to have had a happy childhood.
2. Butterfly getting caught in spider web.
The happy and free butterfly has now landed herself on some real trouble, without her knowing.
3. Cockroach from Cherub's mouth.
Corruption. Ms. Giddens is going to face a lot of negativity/obstacles in her life, something her happy childhood had not prepared her well for.
4. Falling white rose petals.
Ms. Giddens is supposed to be 'pure' in mind. Her imminent challenges in the house will make her lose her pure mind.
5. Pendulum tapping on window.
The pendulum can be seen as a phallic object, the window as a yonic object, symbolizing the intense sexual acts of Quint and Ms. Jessel. Moans of pleasure was also heard during this scene.
6. The dove with the broken neck
Miles was hiding a dead dove with a broken neck under his pillow. Doves had always been a symbol of purity/virginity. A broken neck signify that this purity had been sullied, a somewhat dead giveaway that Miles 'purity' had been compromised. The act of hiding the dead dove may signal he is keeping it secret and hidden (shame and guilt), we could imagine Quint telling the boy to not speak of their adventures together. This uncomfortable scene ended in Miles kissing the governess goodnight on the mouth, something Quint might have done to Miles, or seen Ms. Jessel and her lover do it.
7. The Bly House itself.
Ms. Giddens repeatedly says how the house is so beautiful and large. I see a isolated, desolate, bleak house with too dark an aura. Despite having lots of windows, it is still dark and gloomy inside. Many closed doors in the house symbolize a lot of painful negative memories embedded in the walls of the house. Freshly cut flowers become limp immediately, suggesting the strong maladies in the house is making the living things inside it sick. Beautiful things do not thrive there. The house, just looking at it, gives me a claustrophobic, trapped feeling. It's gothic Victorian design makes you depressed just looking at it. Strange statues and figurines of odd humans and creatures makes the house completely unsuitable for living. Seriously, why do they have random statues of men in the garden, and if Ms. Jessel really killed herself, why is she buried in a churchyard?
So yah, that's it.
