The Thirteenth Tale (2013) Hey what's up guys. Today I'll show you
a thriller-Drama film: "The Thirteenth Tale"! Spoiler ahead, watch out and take care!
The movie begins with a biographer named Margaret, traveling to the remote English countryside. She
is there because she was commissioned to write the biography of the famous novelist, named Vida.
Vida is now an old woman who lives in a grand old manor. Upon walking to the front door,
Margaret is greeted by the prim woman, who's Vida's housekeeper.
She leads Margaret to the guest bedroom, and tells her that Vida will meet her at the library.
Margaret wastes no time putting down her bags, and heading to the library.
When she steps inside, she initially thinks that Vida is not there.
So Margaret browses the bookshelves, and sees the many books that Vida penned throughout her career.
She is then surprised when an old woman speaks up. It turns out, Vida is lying on a settee in the
corner of the library. The old woman immediately asks Margaret if she has read her books.
Margaret sits down next to Vida, and replies that she has read almost all her novels. Margaret then
asks Vida why she had chosen her to write her biography. Vida admits that she wasn't
particularly impressed with Margaret's previous writings, except for a past article she did on
twins. Margaret interjects and mentions that in the several interviews featuring Vida throughout
her career, she has always told a different story about her past and her background. She
says that she's not eager to write about Vida's life, knowing that she may be lying to her.
Vida answers that she's already old and dying; she will tell the truth this time because this is her
legacy. Margaret agrees to be her biographer, provided that she will only use facts in her
story. She starts by double-checking information in the public records, such as her original name,
her place of birth, and something that happened to her while she was young. In exchange,
Vida stipulates that Margaret has to allow her to tell her story without any interruptions.
Vida begins her story. She had grown up in a haunted house, near the manor where she lives
now. When she was 17 years old, that house burned down. She shows Margaret a key-shaped burn-mark
on her palm, that was the result of the fire. Later that night, Margaret verifies the fire story
by researching local news articles. The articles prove that Vida was telling the truth.
The next day, Margaret meets with Vida's doctor. He informs her that Vida has
terminal pancreatic cancer, and time is of the essence for her to complete the book.
Afterward, Vida continues her story. The estate where she grew up was decaying,
by the time her mother and her uncle inherited it after the war. The only two servants in the house
left were the housekeeper and the gardener. The mother's husband had died in the war,
and was left alone with two red-headed twins. Their names were Adeline and Emmeline.
The twins were identical, and even their mother did not know which one was which.
It also became apparent that the mother did not care about her children, and left them alone
to be taken care of by the housekeeper. The uncle held control over the twin's mother.
It is implied that he has been abusing her, making her get pregnant with the twins. To escape the
shame, she left the estate and got married. But since her husband died, she has no choice but to
depend on her brother once again. True enough, the uncle immediately went back to his abusive ways,
and began to hurt the mother. Vida also reveals that the reason
why most of the servants left, was because of the uncle's cruelty. He was not of sound mind,
and was prone to abuse and violence. While they were growing up, the twins were
left to their own devices. They had no schooling or lessons on conduct at all.
They just roamed around the estate like a pair of wild creatures. They don't even speak English,
but just invented their own language. As a result, the twins also had no notion of right and wrong.
They did what they liked no matter the consequences. Case in point, one day, they
grabbed a stroller containing a baby, and let it roll down a hill, causing the baby to fall.
The local doctor's wife arrived at the house to talk to the twins' mother about the baby.
She was surprised at how rundown the house is. While she was snooping around one of the rooms,
a woman in white attacked her. The doctor himself then came to the house to treat his wife's injury.
He discovered the twins' mother, who was now mentally unstable due to years
of her brother's abuse. The doctor had her committed to an asylum because of her issues.
The separation drove the uncle to despair. Meanwhile, Margaret goes on a walk to the land,
where the estate used to stand. She sees an unknown figure lurking around there.
In the past, the doctor hired a governess to finally teach the twins proper manners
and basic education. Emmeline is responsive to the governess' efforts,
but Adeline refused to be domesticated. She even stabbed her sister in the foot with a pencil.
She resented the governess for driving a wedge between her and her sister.
One day, the governess saw a woman in white walking down the hallway.
the housekeeper told her that this was the ghost that haunted the estate.
The doctor began to visit the estate frequently. He grew closer to the young governess. She
complained to him about Adeline's stubbornness. She suggested that they separate the twins,
because they are too co-dependent with each other. The doctor agreed,
and they took Adeline away from the estate. The separation affected the twins negatively.
Emmaline locked herself in her room, and wouldn't stop weeping.
Meanwhile, Adeline was put under the care of the doctor and his wife. The governess spent a lot of
time with the doctor discussing their experiment. But there was no progress with the twins at all.
They just continued to miss each other. The governess also began to notice that locked
rooms in the house were unlocked inexplicably. One day, she saw the twins walking together
on the grounds. She immediately headed to the doctor's house, and discovered that Adeline was
still there. She sobbed and cried out that she must be going insane. The doctor comforted her,
and they ended up sharing a tongue wrestling. The doctor's wife saw this kiss.
So She sent Adeline back to the estate. Meanwhile, the governess and the doctor
disappeared shortly after. Vida tells Margaret that it was believed they eloped to America.
The twins were reunited with each other. But when Adeline ran to Emmaline, she suddenly hit her
sister and attacked her. At this point, Margaret assumes that Vida was Adeline, and asks Vida why
she did that. But Vida couldn't explain why. About five years later, they received the news
that their mother had died in the asylum. Shortly after, their uncle couldn't cope with his grief,
and he also disappeared. Adeline discovered his body in the woods, but she never told anybody
about it. It appeared that he shot himself. The gardener decided to keep things normal
despite the uncle's disappearance. They would still be getting money that they get
every month from the family lawyer. One day, the twins were playing tennis
in one of the rooms. The housekeeper was cleaning the stairs when she fell
down to the ground floor, and died. The gardener then hired a young man to
help out with the house chores, now that the housekeeper was gone.
The gardener was next. He died after falling down a ladder. Adeline checked the ladder herself,
and saw that the safety latch was unlocked. She knew that the gardener always made sure
that the safety latch was on, meaning that someone had deliberately caused the death of
the gardener, and probably the housekeeper. Margaret voices out her suspicion that it was Vida
or Adeline, who had killed the housekeeper and the gardener. But Vida doesn't answer her allegation,
and simply tells Margaret to wait until she finishes her story.
In the present, Margaret sees an elderly woman in white, wailing on the grounds one night.
She kept gesturing to the ground. The next morning, she sees Vida go to the elderly
woman's room, and feed her. Margaret assumes that the elderly woman is Emmaline.
Margaret visits the ruins of the manor again, and sees signs that someone is living there.
She surmises that the man she saw previously is the one living in the ruins.
She goes to Vida's doctor, and asks him who the strange man on the estate is.
He reveals that he is a local man who is addled in the brain, but otherwise harmless.
Margaret finally confronts Vida about seeing Emmeline. Again, Vida dodges her question,
and instead asks Margaret about her own life story. She quickly
replies that she doesn't have a story. After a night of dreaming about two girls and a
car, Margaret breaks down in front of Vida. She confesses that she had a twin sister too. When
they were kids, they got into a fight, and her sister crossed the road to go to her. A speeding
car then hit her sister, and killed her. Margaret had carried the guilt with her ever since.
Afterward, Margaret visits the ruins of the manor again. She talks with the homeless man
living there. He tells her that a skeleton had been found by the police inside the manor.
Margaret realizes that Vida had never actually confirmed that she was Adeline. This leads her
to conclude that there were three girls, who grew up on the estate, not just two.
Vida confirms her theory. She reveals that she was born a few months after the twins.
Her mother was unknown; but the gardener suspected that her father was the twins' uncle,
because she had the same red hair, and she was left on the uncle's estate. The gardener raised
her, and she would often play with the twins. It turns out, Adeline had always been wild and feral,
and she was the one who attacked the doctor's wife, and killed the housekeeper and the gardener.
She was the woman in white, that haunted the hallways of the manor.
In the flashback, the gardener discovered one day that Emmeline was impregnated by the young
man the gardener hired. She fired him, and was resolved to deliver and raise the baby alone
with no help from outsiders. But Adeline was jealous of how Emmeline was devoted to the baby.
she caught the feral twin attempting to kill the baby. Fortunately, she rescued the child.
But Adeline was hellbent on killing the baby. Vida caught her trying to set the baby on fire.
She immediately grabbed the baby, and hid him in the woods. When she returned to the house,
she found Adeline and Emmeline fighting each other. Emmeline had thought that
her twin sister had done something to her baby. A fire had also started in the room,
and was quickly spreading throughout the house. Vida managed to drag Emmeline out of the room, and
she left the violent Adeline inside. She used the key to lock the door, and the heat of the flames
created the key-shaped burn-mark on her palm. Afterward, Vida retrieved the baby from the woods,
and left it at the doorstep of the kind baker's widow in town. She knew that the woman would raise
the baby, and he would be better off there. The baby grew up to be the homeless man that Margaret
had seen living in the ruins of the estate. Emmeline became mentally unwell after the death
of her twin sister, and the loss of her baby. Vida has been taking care of her ever since.
With her story finally revealed, Vida is now ready to leave the world. She passes
away in her sleep later that night. Meanwhile, Margaret decides to stay in
the area a little longer. The movie ends with Margaret informing her doctor that
she will be writing her own biography, while staying in the countryside.
This's Daniel CC movie channel! Stay safe and enjoy your day!