In Other, directed by David Moreau, the horror is rooted in trauma and suffering, though the film, for the longest time, tries to convince you it’s a creature feature. It begins with the death of an elderly woman who lived in a mansion in Minnesota in the middle of the woods. After the security alarms went off, the woman stepped out of her house. It didn’t look like someone had trespassed; she seemed to be searching for, possibly, her pet dog that escaped from her house. She followed the signal of the dog collar, but she soon found out that the collar had been left in the woods, but the ‘dog’ was gone. Suddenly a creature pounced on the woman, and the next thing we knew, she was dead and her face was ripped off. Her body was discovered a week later by an enthusiastic teen who was independently investigating a murder case when he flew a drone to check what was going on in the woods and came across the body. The deceased’s daughter, Alice, was informed about her mother’s death, and after years of staying away from her hometown, she finally didn’t have a choice but to return home.
Spoiler Alert
Who was the killer?
Other’s ending revealed that ‘the beast’ was actually Alice’s son. Alice was seventeen when she conceived, but she had no recollection of it. After a traumatizing childhood, Alice chose to distance herself from her mother, Elena. She was reminded of her blue days as soon as she landed in Minnesota. She had every intention of just dealing with the situation in a day and returning home to her loving husband, Charlie, the very next morning, but things didn’t go as planned. Her mother’s body was taken for autopsy, so she didn’t have permission to bury the body yet. When Alice walked into what used to be her room, she went through her old makeup and diary and eventually found the jacket of her teen crush, James Houston. She sniffed the jacket and pulled it on; her attachment to the garment suggested that she used to be deeply in love with the football player, and she still hoped to get a whiff of his scent. Her secret digital diary revealed that she had sex with him in high school, and this explains her pregnancy as a teenager.
Elena was obsessed with preparing her daughter for beauty pageants. She was not allowed to eat food with fat or carbs, she was scolded if she gained weight, her mother tucked her belly to hide her bulge, and she was punished if she didn’t stand, speak, or walk with perfection. Alice had won the Miss Minnesota Teen title, and that was perhaps the most defining moment of her mother’s life. But the crown, the dress, and the sash reminded Alice of the worst days of her life.
After getting sloshed and donning the beauty pageant attire, Alice remembered the screams and cries that she often heard as a teenager. She was always told that she’d been dreaming and none of it was real, but after returning home as a grown adult, she was convinced that it was all true and that her mother had lied to her. The ending suggests that the screams and cries she heard were of her child. Elena was obsessed with recording every practice session, and in one such video, we witness her tightly tape Alice’s abdomen to hide the bulge; so was Alice completely unaware of her pregnancy? The obvious symptoms should’ve been concerning for Alice, but she likely feared bringing it up with her mother or even finding out for herself because she simply couldn’t afford to be imperfect. She lied to herself and preferred being blissfully unaware for as long as she could. It was only after she was compelled to remember her past, indirectly by ‘the beast,’ that she finally gathered the courage to watch the videotape of her giving birth.
Alice’s son had arranged the videotapes in a certain pattern so that his mother would finally confront the past that she was trained to forget. Alice watched her younger self perfect her posture and obey her mother’s every instruction until she just couldn’t. She was experiencing labor pain, yet she didn’t whimper, and it was only after her water broke that her mother came to rescue her. When she removed the tape from her abdomen, Alice’s belly protruded. Her mother pulled the baby out and hastily ripped off the umbilical cord. She wasn’t bothered about the baby; her only concern was Alice and the beauty pageant competition that she was expected to participate in. After watching the video, Alice finally came to terms with the fact that she was a mother. All these years her body was conditioned to live in denial, so when she finally confronted the truth, it was overwhelming.
Why did ‘the beast’ attack only the face?
A ‘boy with a mask’ with a YouTube channel was determined to find the reason behind the suspicious death of a teenager. He’d been missing for a month, and when his body was discovered, his face was completely mauled. It was assumed that the animals in the woods had devoured him, but the boy with a mask couldn’t figure out why they would attack only his face and not the rest of his body. The boy sensed there was something mysterious about the place, so he started setting up hidden cameras around the woods to find out the truth.
When Alice arrived home, she crossed paths with the boy in a mask, and he repeatedly asked Alice to cover her face. Alice didn’t understand why she was being told to do so—as it turned out, the boy had already discovered the only way to stay safe from ‘the beast’ was to wear a mask and avoid eye contact. When Alice was under attack, the boy in a mask lured her into his temporary hideout. He agreed to release Alice only if she promised to fix the night-vision cameras inside the house. Alice agreed to the deal, but she repeatedly asked him over walkie-talkie to call the cops already. When the boy figured that the situation was possibly about to go out of hand, he notified the cops.
Before the cops came to her rescue, Alice’s son came into close contact with his mother. She followed the boy’s instruction and didn’t look ‘the beast’ in the eye. Although ‘the beast’ had attempted to kill her before, when it came in contact with Alice, something shifted. It caressed her hair before hiding away. Years of solitude had stripped ‘the beast’ of any real sense of self. But when Alice arrived at the mansion, he might have found himself wondering if there was a connection between them. Maybe he’d even figured out that Alice was his mother (the piled-up videotapes suggested so), but somewhere deep down he also had a deep resentment towards her for leaving him behind (and that explains the attacks), or he was simply driven by the instinct of killing anyone who came into his space. Since birth, he was denied love and affection, and he perhaps always assumed that ‘people,’ in general, wanted to get rid of him, and he had to kill for self-preservation. His hatred towards his grandmother was definitely why he’d tactically attacked her. She also had a heart condition, so that explained why the attack resulted in her instant death. Maybe the teenage boy who went missing in 2011 somehow found his way into the mansion, and since ‘the beast’ hadn’t seen the boy before, his instinct was to kill. From the time he was an infant, Alice’s son was kept in a makeshift room in the basement. Soundproofed and bare, the room held only a thin floor mattress, a bowl for food and water, and a ton of dolls littering the floor. It was a tiny space, and one had to crawl to move around, which explains why Alice’s son walked on all fours. So, why did he attack only the face?
During Other’s ending, when the inquisitive boy in a mask managed to break into the house after the cops left, he found his way to the basement and discovered the tiny room. He noticed that the faces of the dolls were carefully removed, and just when he wondered why, he saw his reflection on the metallic cushion wall. The distorted image explained why Alice’s son must have grown hateful of faces. He was constantly surrounded by his own distorted image, and he became afraid of stares and faces in general. It’s possible he also saw his reflection in his victims’ eyes, and it enraged him.
What does ‘Other’ mean?
In Other’s ending, when Alice was admitted to a hospital after the cops showed up, her son secretly came to visit her. The smoke alarm suddenly went off, resulting in complete chaos at the hospital. Alice figured that maybe her child was trying to get in touch with her, so she stepped out of her room. She followed the sound of a mechanical voice calling out ‘Other.’ Alice walked into the washroom and searched for the source. She noticed a device lying inside one of the cubicles. She pulled it out. It was a kid’s gadget for interactive learning, and someone had typed the word ‘Other’ into it. Alice wondered what it meant, and when she noticed the missing ‘M’ key, she realized that someone had tried to type ‘mother.’ During the final scene of Other, ‘the beast’ walks into the washroom; from being on all fours, he tries to stand on his two feet. His face was covered with a mask that he finally removed to reveal his face. Alice experienced motherly joy for the very first time in her life. She sensed that her son was ready to accept her, and perhaps she looked forward to making up for the lost time.
What does the final scene suggest?
Alice was pregnant when she arrived at the mansion. Considering she had been through some physically demanding situations, we don’t really know if her baby survived. Her husband, Charlie, was killed by her son. He’d decided to stop by at the mansion after he discovered that Alice was pregnant. ‘The beast’ trapped him in the house, and before Alice could even find her way back to the mansion, he killed Charlie. Finding out that she had a son who was held captive and treated like a beast all his life must have been shocking, and while the film emphasizes the reunion of mother and son, one cannot help but wonder if Alice will ever come to terms with the fact that her son had also murdered the love of her life. Additionally, he was also responsible for her own mother’s death and had possibly killed a teenage boy as well. Considering there was a witness (the boy in a mask, who had gathered evidence) and the cops had also gotten involved, there would be some repercussions. Since Alice’s son wasn’t mentally stable, he won’t likely face a trial, but he will receive treatment to overcome the years of isolation and torture. Perhaps, with Alice’s support, he’ll learn to heal. If Alice is still pregnant, she’ll also get the chance to experience motherhood again, and this time she’ll try to do everything right. The ending is bittersweet; the reunion is definitely the silver lining, but there is also a lot of trauma to process for both Alice and her son. David Moreau intentionally conceals the faces of most of the characters, either with masks or with the help of a broken security system where one’s face appears distorted. The idea is to possibly see the world through ‘the beast’s eyes. Alice’s face was the only one he wasn’t afraid of, and he wasn’t scared to bare himself completely.
