I guess this is just what I Do Now. I didn’t track down the MR James stories for todays adaptations because……I watched Too Many and I didn’t think there was time. Such is life. I like doing these short films because it’s a way to get a little chunk of Art in when I don’t feel like my brain will play along with a long form narrative. Also it is so, so cold here, and that is just good ghost story weather.
The first short film tonight wasn’t actually a BBC one, it was 1987’s ‘The Black Tower’, a compelling minimalist masterpiece of paranoia. There is a sequence in it that really struck me, in which we are shown the view out a window, split in half by a tree, and we see cars zoom from one side of the frame, only to never emerge from the other. I found that device extremely disquieting, and while I know on a technical level it was meant to show the narrator’s devolving mental state, it also helps add to the overall sense of unreality that hangs over the short, and is probably going to be the bit that Sticks with me.
Next, 1978’s ‘The Ice House’, a BBC Christmas Ghost Story so poorly received they canceled the whole program about it. I loved it, is the thing. No idea what the hell it meant. But I love a creepy wellness retreat. I love creepy siblings with barely concealed incestuous desires. I loved most of all that the plotline was something that is almost exclusively reserved for young women (lone traveler gets gaslighted into mental collapse by strangers who seem over concerned about your welfare to Grim Ends) happening to a middle aged man. There is sinister homoeroticism! There is the terrible isolation of the countryside! There is an evil plant! There are questions never answered! Overall, my idea of a good time.
1973’s ‘Lost Hearts’ was on the cornier side. The ghosts were goofy, the plot fairly obvious, the atmosphere oddly dull, and the scares not very. At least besides five minutes close to the end. The ghosts themselves? Not creepy. Those are clearly little kids you painted blue and put fake fingernails on and they are Not selling this. However. When the doddering old man drops his act and drugs his ward as his ‘birthday present’, ripping the boy’s shirt open and grabbing his knife so he can complete his final human sacrifice, the short is suddenly infused with a sense of pure dread. This is quickly dispelled by the appearance of the just really silly ghosts, but they had me for a minute there.
Equally lackluster was 1971’s ‘The Stalls of Barchester.’ It was Fine. Neat little story, hampered by the short’s tonal inconsistency and lack of commitment towards either being funny or spooky. In the end it really achieved neither, though there were a couple moments that were appropriately sinister, like when the scheming Archdeacon is told by a third party they saw a man with him even though he was walking alone, or when he found out there was never a cat in his house despite himself and a guest both seeing the cat. But it never fully gelled. I’d be interested to see if the source material lands better.
Lastly was The Treasure of Abbot Thomas.’ Was this as good as say, ‘The Signalman’ or ‘Stigma’? No. But it was just pure old fun. A teenage boy with mommy issues and his Only Friend, an aging Anglican priest who decidedly does not believe in ghosts, yes and each other into a treasure hunt, running into the legacy of an evil alchemist priest of days of yore. This all proceeds pretty much as you’d expect, with the addition of some evil ooze, and while it wasn’t anything groundbreaking, it was a lot of fun.
All in all these are almost all worth tracking down to watch. The forecast is predicting another week of polar vortex. Stepping outside, even so briefly as to take out the trash, punches the very air out of your lungs. The sun does not come out, and the cloud cover is thick. On does when it does clear up, it is far too cold for the sun to make any difference. And so we turn to the old fashioned ghost story, because the long cold night are built for that. It’s a way to channel the despair brought on by the cold, and to lighten the drudgery brought on by the Confinement the cold requires. Wrap yourself in several blankets, turn on some ghost stories, and stay warm.
Signing off,
Marlowe
Marlowe Writes 