The Watcher in the Woods (1980) on Netflix
PG19801h 24mFamilyHorrorMystery
An American family moves into an old manor in rural England. Mrs. Aylwood, its owner, notices that daughter Jan resembles her own girl, who disappeared thirty years earlier.
- Netflix3.2/5
- IMDb6.1/107,913 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes52%
Trailer
Plot summary
Mrs. Aylwood owns an old manor in the English countryside and lives in the guest house next door. When the American Curtis family moves in, she sees that the older daughter, Jan, looks strikingly like her own daughter Karen, who went missing in the woods thirty years before. Jan soon notices odd things about the place: blue lights in the woods, triangles and glowing objects, and a blindfolded girl reflected in a mirror. Ellie, Jan's younger sister, buys a puppy and names it Nerak, which is Karen spelled backwards. Mike Fleming, whose mother Mary lives nearby, tells Jan about the missing daughter. When Nerak runs into the woods, Ellie chases after him.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Watcher in the Woods (1980)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Davis desperately wanted to play both parts, so make-up and hair specialists were flown in from Los Angeles to reverse her age by thirty years for screen tests. Hough felt they had knocked off twenty years, not forty, and told the 72-year-old: Bette, I don't think you've made it. She replied: you're goddamn right.
- The Watcher in the Woods had its world premiere at the Ziegfeld Theatre in New York City on April 17, 1980, but was pulled from release after ten days, and future screenings were canceled by the studio because of an overwhelming negative response from critics and audiences.
- Besides studio writers, science fiction writers including Robert Silverberg, Joe Haldeman and the Niven/Pournelle team were brought in separately and paid for alternate endings, though apparently none were used. Visual effects designer Harrison Ellenshaw said there were roughly 152 possible endings, and he wrote the one used for the 1981 re-release.
- In casting the leading part of Jan, Diane Lane had been the initial choice but declined. The part went to Lynn-Holly Johnson, known as a professional figure skater and for playing a blind ice skater in the 1978 film Ice Castles, for which she received a Golden Globe nomination.
- Due to the 1980 actors strike, Davis was unable to return to England to film the reshoots, so her additional footage was shot in California instead.
