Samhain Project '24: The Other

 

The Other, based on Thomas Tryon's novel (which I believe my sister Linda had a paperback copy of) is an interesting production.  The first half is like an episode of Little House on the Prairie (oddly, Little House's Victor French plays a small but key role here) and features real life twin brothers Chris and Martin Udvarnosky in convincing roles as twins Niles and Holland.  They are exquisite in their roles as little boys running about their family farm, basking in the joys of the land, the house, and the family. 

Not hard to see, and very early, how this film must have influenced Goodnight, Mommy.  Farm life and running free with your twin brother seems grand enough at the outset, until grisly occurrences open the door to memories of heartbreaking events in the recent past.

    

You feel on the brink of true disaster at this point.

A loving grandmother, stepping forward where the boys' mother and cousins and aunts and uncles cannot, tries to stop the nightmare the second half of the film descends into.  She fights a difficult mental and emotional battle.  That's how much she loves our young leads. Maybe too much. 

As warm as The Other opens, it closes just as dark.  It's brutal as shit, and the ending is a kick in the fucking nuts.  Well worth watching as the ending turns a Norman Rockwell painting into something sinister and twisted.  

It's amazing that although it was produced in 1972 by the director of To Kill a Mockingbird and Summer of '42, unlike those other wonderful efforts, it's a production you'll want to forget right after you've seen it.  

Not because The Other is a bad movie, but because it becomes something wretched by the end.