Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		3.0

The Turning Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman March 24, 2021

Director Floria Sigismondi (The Runaways) and Screenwriter siblings Carey and Chad Hayes (House of Wax, The Conjuring) adapt Henry James' 1898 literature staple The Turning of the Screw for the screen in The Turning, an atmospheric Horror film that aesthetically adheres to contemporary convention and accomplishes little more than regurgitating stale genre motifs. The picture is well made, to be sure, technically proficient in every way but it's lacking soul. It simply powers through familiar Horror tropes: unusual happenings, ghastly apparitions, a dark history, a mysterious wealthy family, an intimidatingly large estate, and the embattled newcomer who finds herself forced to face her own fears and the family's darkest secrets. Honestly, yawn. It's a decent enough time killer but inventive or invigorating in any way this film is not.

Kate Mandell (Mackenzie Davis) is giving up the classroom for a private tutoring/governess gig. She says goodbye to her best friend and institutionalized mother and arrives at a palatial estate that seems as large as a small country. There she is rather coldly greeted by the estate’s longtime caretaker, Mrs. Grose (Barbara Marten). Soon, Kate meets her student, young Flora (Brooklynn Prince), who by all appearances is a typical happy-go-lucky adolescent. But there’s one peculiarity about her: she refuses to leave the estate. A severe past trauma that unfolded right beyond the estate’s gates still haunts her. Kate is happy enough to respect that wish but it quickly becomes apparent that inside the gate, within the estate’s walls, is something sinister. Flora’s brother Miles (Finn Wolfhard) unexpectedly returns from boarding school and, along with his sister, begins to badly mistreat Kate. Kate presses forward but as the mistreatment grows more intense and the truths about deceased former estate employees, and the house itself, reveal themselves, Kate finds herself in the midst of physical terror and emotional upheaval.

If the atmosphere were not so familiar, if the story rhythm and structure were not so predictable, and if the characters were more complex and engaging, The Turning might have proven more fundamentally effective. But the picture, even for the general level of disquiet and discomfort it unveils in the opening act, can only go so far when there's little meat on the bones. Certainly the source novel is a classic in literary circles, a novel with a rich story and a deep, if not evolving, appreciation for its structure, style, story, and significance. But here is a movie adaptation made with little soul or passion. That's not to suggest that the filmmakers skirted duties -- the film looks quite good and its technical merits are to be commended -- but there's just no tangible sense of personality to the movie. It's content to take the story basics, rework them for the modern world and into a contemporary genre framework, and refuse to find its own purposes and proclivities along the way. The film skirts that line between structural competence and narrative insignificance, often favoring the latter, and never finding motivation to identify as a wholly unique experience in any way.

Neither does the cast accomplish much in building memorable personas. The characters may be victim to complex, unnatural, supernatural machinations but the script offers the actors little incentive to go above and beyond, leaving them to explore trite genre beats. They fit into the atmosphere. They never define it. The film is at its best when it's the simple interactions: when Kate is learning to ride, when she's trying to drive the kids into town, when she's confronting them for their bad behavior or at odds with Mrs. Grose. But anytime the filmmakers allow the mood to manage the film -- which is for most of the runtime -- it falls into a pit of relative narrative hopelessness where those exercises in off-the-shelf, paint-by-numbers genre moviemaking suffocate the hints of good that exist in this adaptation. The film is, in a word, forgettable, in another two, lacking identity. It's a passable time waster that genre buffs might find of some familiar comfort but forget finding valuable moviemaking here.

The Turning Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Turning delivers a fairly standard 1080p transfer for a new digitally photographed midrange picture. The image delivers the usual suite of high yield detail and good color, though both are somewhat limited by the movie's darker, bleaker production design. But even in lower light the picture proves well capable of delivering well rounded skin, clothing, and environmental textures, though of course in the more evenly or brightly lit scenes the viewer will find more stout and sturdy output. Color-wise, there are some interesting design juxtapositions. When Kate arrives at the house under the opening titles, it's bleak and gray – the sky is overcast, the stone is gray, and even the green grass seems to be somewhat depressed – while she's wearing a lively, brilliant red jacket. This is a theme through much of the movie: bleak tones broken up by intense reds, but at the same time there's a further tonal depression that becomes more evident through the film as even the brighter shades are drained with more evident amplification. It's not a particularly creative use of color, but it is effective. Black levels are fine, whether true low light or broken up by high yield beam flashlights. Skin tones range from relatively healthy to pale and ghastly, all by design. Noise only spikes in low light, which is frequent, and there is some banding in a difficult dark underwater scene at the 36-minute mark. Otherwise, this one's pretty well good to go.

The Turning Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Turning features a relatively robust and nicely detailed Dolby TrueHD 7.1 lossless soundtrack. The track demonstrates fine command of space: notably, to start, realistic reverb through an empty swimming pool area at the five-minute mark. It's effortlessly large and well capable of transforming the soundstage into the big, mostly empty, location. Several such examples follow throughout the film. Thunder rolls through the speakers, various cracks and whispers linger in the house, and some heavier creaks and crashes always prove exceptionally well defined for detail and fine-tuned spacing alike. Familiar Horror score elements – a mix of high strings and low-end output – prove quite capable for clarity and stage saturation, with precise elemental placement and sound movement. Dialogue is clear and precise with a natural front-center output that only expands when the environment naturally permits.

The Turning Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The Turning includes an alternate ending, deleted scenes, and a featurette. A DVD copy of the film and a Movies Anywhere digital copy code are included with purchase. This release ships with an embossed slipcover.

• Alternate Ending (1080p, 3:34).
• Deleted Scenes (1080p, 4:59): Included are Mrs. Grose's Confession, Miles Stands Over Dead Swan, and Jessel on Lake.
• Behind The Turning (1080p, 10:31): Discussing story, its themes, the novella's legacy, exploring the story in the prism of the "#MeToo" generation, cast and performances, sets, scares, Floria Sigismondi's direction, and more.

The Turning Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

It's slow going to develop the story, but it's familiar going which ultimately goes nowhere. Pacing is not the film's problem – dripping information and building atmosphere is what these movies do – but rather it's the film's inability to do anything of creative interest or dramatic significance with the story. Some creepy vibes and eerie happenings are simply markers along the way. They come predictably and familiarly. The Turning is a simple recycling and regurgitating of genre tropes that leans on its technical expertise rather than any unique characteristics to sell a movie that isn't worth buying. Universal's Blu-ray does deliver perfectly good video and audio presentations and also brings with it a handful of extras. Rental.