PLOT SUMMARY: Based on the Henry James story The Turn of the Screw, a young governess is hired to take care of a little girl but it is when her brother returns from school, that some terrible secrets about the family are revealed.
Fortunate are those teachers and nannies, who are given the responsibility of well-behaved, sweet, and innocent little children.
THE TURNING Movie Plot
That’s the first scene in The Turning, and the first thought that will cross your mind when you see a woman, frantically running away from a mansion in the dark of the night.
Then she’s attacked by something and you’ll think, oh it’s not bratty kids, but something horror-y.
Turns out the kids are worse than the haunting.
Cut to some time later, and we meet Kate who leaves her teaching job to take up an opportunity as a governess for a little seven-year-old girl.
Her friend advises her against it, but Kate is probably enticed by the offer of living in a big mansion and handling only one kid. How difficult could that be?
Before leaving, Kate meets with her mother who is at the mental institution and who makes weird paintings. She gifts Kate a painting of herself in two different shades, probably a foreshadow of what mental agony Kate is going to face later in the story.
She heads out to the Estate and meets with Mrs Grose who is tending the garden by the fountain where there are several doll heads placed. Another indication of the kind of kids Kate is going to be taking care of. Beheaded dolls sure is an indication of a troubled child, going by innumerable horror movies.
Mrs Grose gives her a tour of the house, mostly just showing her the kitchen where Kate will spend the most time sitting and moping. She doesn’t bother with directing her to her room or anything. Doesn’t even introduce her to the girl she’s going to be taking care of, Flora.
Kate decides to go by herself to look for Flora by the stables, and after she leaves, the old woman gives a knowing smirk, one that the housekeepers usually give to the visitors of the house that is haunted.
She knows what is going on and what is going to happen, but will remain conveniently quiet until the third act. And then also, she will let the protagonist make their own deductions and only agree to their findings.
Kate heads off to the stables and stumbles across a mean, wild black horse who doesn’t like her. Flora comes running behind her and introduces her to a white horse who is much more peaceful. She giggles at Kate’s surprise at being attacked and asks her to give the horse an apple she has in her pocket and one she took from the kitchen.
Kate is surprised at Flora’s keen eye and gives the apple to the horse, then is lectured about the seeds containing tiny amounts of cyanide.
Kate is impressed with Flora’s knowledge of things. Flora gives Kate a tour around the house while going on about how her previous tutor, Jessel, thought she was a genius. Then she misuses a word, saying dentistry instead of dysentery, and Flora looks crestfallen. She doesn’t like to be corrected.
Like in every large house, there’s always an area people are not allowed to enter. In this case, it is the East Wing. Kate is shown Flora’s grandmother’s sewing room where Jessel also was working on a dress for Flora that is left incomplete. Another mannequin has pins sticking out of the chest, which Flora claims her elder brother Miles is responsible for.
Kate thinks it’s weird and hopes she doesn’t have to deal with Miles. After all, she was promised she would only be taking care of the girl whose brother is away at boarding school.
Kate is shown her bedroom which belonged to Flora’s grandmother. In fact, there’s a life-sized doll of her as well, or maybe the grandmother was eccentric enough to turn one of her mannequins into herself.
Kate is disturbed by it and immediately puts it into the sewing room, turning its head away for no reason at all. The head springs back right again. Not necessarily a show of a haunting, but probably the mechanism.
Late at night, Kate hears noises coming from the East Wing, and of course, heads there immediately. It doesn’t matter if he was told not to go there, Kate likes to break rules. She goes there to satisfy her curiosity but doesn’t see much apart from flying curtains and a mess in the room. Then she hears someone behind her, gasps and finds a boy standing behind her.
He says something arrogant and Kate realizes he must be Flora’s haughty brother Miles.
The next day, they are in the living room and Flora is playing with her brother Miles. Flora remarks about how he shouldn’t be wearing Quint’s sweater and Kate wants to know who Quint was. He was a horse riding instructor who died.
Kate gets curious about the tutor who supposedly left in a hurry and abandoned her charge and an instructor who died recently. Not to mention, she wasn’t allowed to take Flora out for ice cream the previous day.
She receives a call from Miles’ boarding school and her face changes expression. Miles stares at her from across the room, maybe. There is hair falling over his eyes in every scene so we can’t be sure.
Kate doesn’t say anything to him and states he has school work listed down for him.
Miles doesn’t need to worry about that because Kate doesn’t seem too interested in teaching the kids. She does like to roam around the estate and speculate about recent events.
She tells Miles to pick up his plate because Mrs Grose did the cooking and the least he can do is pick up after himself. Her attempt to discipline the kids fails miserably as she is met with a big ‘No’ from everyone, including Mrs Grose who reminds her the kids were born into privilege and will remain spoilt if they want to.
She also refuses to believe that Miles is capable of violence when Kate tells her the real reason Miles was expelled. He had slammed a boy’s head against the wall repeatedly.
Later that night, Kate calls her friend to complain about how easy her job isn’t anymore because she just wanted to look after a seven-year-old girl, not a boy who hates her. While she’s doing so, she hears Flora scream and looks out the window to see her drowning in the pool.
Kate, realizing she’s terrible at her job and is going to be let go, races to the pool and dives in. She tries to grab Flora underwater and instead sees another woman trying to grab her.
Kate freaks out and gets out of the pool. She hears laughing and sees Flora and Miles. It was all a prank.
Mrs Grose asks what happened and Kate is cross for being all wet. She goes to her room, changes her clothes and switches off the light, but sees weird visions and hears strange noises so turns on the lights and closes her eyes.
The next instant, she feels someone’s hand on her. It’s Miles, wearing Quint’s sweater and watching her sleep. Kate tells him to go away and he makes up a lie about a spider climbing on her that he wanted to retrieve and feed his big spider.
He makes a terrible apology and wants to teach her how to ride a horse. Kate agrees just so creepy Miles can leave. The next day, he keeps whipping the horse and yelling instructions at Kate to perform. She finally manages to do so. That is the only teaching moment we see in the movie. Kate makes no attempt to teach the kids.
She’s mostly seen scribbling away something while Flora is learning by herself and moody Miles is throwing a ball at the wall and creating a ruckus.
They want to show her the koi pond and take her through the maze that Flora said one must know the directions of in order never to get lost.
They reach the pond and in the next instant see one of the fishes being fed on by a crow. Miles scares the crow away but stomps the fish to put it out of its misery.
Flora cries about that fish being her favorite because she can tell them all apart.
Kate offers to take them out to town to buy another fish. Mrs Grose refuses. Flora wants another fish but is scared to leave. Miles is okay with it and to convince Flora, asks the mirror if they can leave. He pretends the mirror is giving them permission and Flora is okay with getting into the car.
As they near the gate, Flora begs her to stop and freaks. Miles too tells her to stop but Kate thinks she knows better and keeps driving thinking the kid will get over her fear. So what if she saw her parents dying in a car accident near the house. A little tough love would help.
Miles threatens to kill her if she doesn’t stop, and that does the trick. Kate realizes she isn’t a psychiatrist and did a terrible job with Flora. Miles pushes her back in the car and tells her to leave them alone. In fact, just to leave.
Kate drives away and finds a phone booth to call her friend and moan about how everyone hates her. Then she remembers the promise she made Flora on the first day. She returns, much to the relief of Miles who hides it behind his mean nature. Kate apologizes to Flora at the stables.
They all decide to play tag with flashlights in the dark. Of course, things go exactly as we expect. Kate gets lost, hears strange noises, feels someone touching her, etc.
She rushes into the living room to find Miles lounging in a chair. She screams at him for pulling pranks on her and he replies nonchalantly that he has been here all this while.
Kate is made to look stupid and returns to her room. She finds Jessel’s diary where she keeps writing about Quint watching her all the time. There is then a Polaroid of Jessel sleeping with a message in a marker of being watched when sleeping.
Kate has more nightmares and her hair has now lost its sheen and is all frizzy. Mrs Grose tosses an envelope on the table in front of her and Kate asks if she opened it. Mrs Grose seems offended at the accusation. Kate removes pages of black painted pages and Mrs Grose makes a comment hoping whatever her mother has isn’t genetic.
THE TURNING Ending Explained with Spoilers!
Kate then sees wet footprints going around the house. She follows them to a lake outside where a hand suddenly shoots up and for some reason, Kate dives into the lake. There she sees Jessel’s body at the bottom and Kate quickly rises and runs out. She goes to get the kids in the house but when she enters her room, she sees a ghostly vision of Quint choking and forcing himself on Jessel.
Mrs Grose appears and asks what is wrong, possibly having seen the vision herself. Kate tells her about Jessel and the old woman hardly seems surprised. She then tells her that she made sure Quint never hurt Jessel again.
Kate is aghast at what she’s learned and barely takes a step away when Quint’s Ghost comes and pushes Mrs Grouse causing her to fall over and die.
Kate runs around the house, finds Flora who refuses to leave without Miles. Kate finds Miles playing the drums. She pulls the plug when he ignores her, then convinced him to come when she tells him she will protect him since she guesses he can see the ghosts as well. The bass starts to play on its own without electricity and that convinces Miles to get moving now.
The kids escape with Kate and get into her car. The painting Kate had received from her mother was some sort of prophecy.
The End.
Nope, turns out that was all a vision. Every single thing. Kate thinks she may be going mad after all.
She last remembers Mrs Grose making a snarky comment about her mother’s condition not being genetic, then goes to get the children, certain they are in danger.
The kids are playing in a messy room with mirrors.
When Kate sees Quint in the mirror and sees the reactions of the kids, she becomes convinced they can see the ghosts too. She asks them to come with her, but they refuse.
While Kate is pulling Flora with her, she breaks her doll by mistake and promises to fix it. Miles reminds her it is porcelain and cannot be fixed. They leave.
Kate then finds herself in the institution with a weird black drawing all over the walls. She approaches her mother who is scribbling away. When she turns, Kate gasps.
The End.
No really, that is how it ends. Draw your own conclusions if you want or care.
The end credits show a woman’s hand feeling every bit of the house.
What did Kate see?
Jessel?
Or did she see herself? Perhaps all this time, it was Kate in the mental institution. It was her who ran away after being tormented by those mean kids who played a vicious trick on her causing her to lose her mind.
Kate was probably on the verge of madness as portrayed by the painting her mother gifted her. The kids and their horrible pranks pushed her over the edge.
Or maybe Kate never did go to the house. Maybe she imagined the whole thing. She probably heard stories about the events at the Estate and imagined she received a lucrative offer from them to become a governess. Perhaps she was tired of her teaching job and imagined living in the lap of luxury and caring for only a child or two.
It was never her mother who was at the institution. It was Kate who had lived all those years there and is often visited by her younger self, trying to piece together her mind and figuring out what drove her crazy.
The movie could have done a lot better just having a clear, plausible ending rather than an abrupt, meaningless one.
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