Das Geisterschloss

A lot of British kids have memories of watching the original run of DR WHO and being forced to hide behind the sofa because they were too scared to watch the screen. I had the same experience, but with me it was THE CHILDREN OF GREEN KNOWE, a Children's BBC 4-part TV series adaptation of the 1950s novel by Lucy M. Boston. I watched this live on TV in 1986 at the age of 5 and it scared the life out of me. It was the bits in which inanimate objects come to life which really disturbed me, although even the rocking horse was spooky. Thankfully, the film has just come out on DVD over here in the UK, so I was able to catch up with it as an adult and I wasn't disappointed.

THE CHILDREN OF GREEN KNOWE is short, simple entertainment. A young boy goes to stay in an old ancestral house over the Christmas break, and soon becomes aware that there are ghostly children from the Stuart era that he can sometimes see. There are also various myths and legends associated with the place that he becomes involved in. This type of story was very familiar in TV & book form back in the day, but it's handled in a completely charming way here. The low budget effects aren't up to much, but the story and execution have bags of atmosphere and charm that make it impossible to dislike. Daphne Oxenford is like Maggie Smith but even better. I miss the days when the BBC had the skill to make stuff like this, as it's the kind of thing which manages the very difficult job of recapturing the magic of being a child - something that modern film and TV makers seem to have forgotten.