Themes: Rape & Sexual Abuse, Kids in Trouble, Innocence Lost
Main Cast: Marlon Brando, Stephanie Beacham, Thora Hird, Verna Harvey, Christopher Ellis
Release Year: 1971
Country: UK
Run Time: 96 minutes
Plot
Marlon Brando delivers a respectably creepy performance in the Michael Winner directed The Nightcomers -- a film inspired by the characters in Henry James' The Turn of the Screw. On a British country estate, two recently-orphaned children, Miles (Christopher Ellis) and Flora (Verna Harvey), live on their own with only a nurse, housekeeper, and gardener as companions. Miles and Flora are particularly fascinated by the gardener, Quint (Marlon Brando). In fact, fascinated to the point of obsession, the boy and girl model their young lives after him. When Quint becomes involved with the prim and proper nurse, Miles surreptitiously views their love-making and keeps it in mind for future reference. Gradually, Miles and Flora adopt the gardener and the nurse's love-hate relationship for their own, copying their adult behavior with child-like abandon. Finally, when the housekeeper finds out and decides to fire the gardener and the nurse, the children are thrown into a panic. Not wanting their two favorite subjects to be separated, the children decide to take things into their own hands. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
Harry Andrews - Master of the House; Anna Palk - Governess
Credit
Herbert Westbrook - Art Director, Michael Winner - Director, Frederick Wilson - Editor, Jerry Fielding - Composer (Music Score), Jerry Fielding - Musical Direction/Supervision, Richard Mills - Makeup, Robert Paynter - Cinematographer, Michael Winner - Producer, Michael Hastings - Screenwriter
