Aggiungi una trama nella tua linguaIn a "live" broadcast on Halloween night, a BBC team investigate a reported poltergeist in an ordinary London home.In a "live" broadcast on Halloween night, a BBC team investigate a reported poltergeist in an ordinary London home.In a "live" broadcast on Halloween night, a BBC team investigate a reported poltergeist in an ordinary London home.
- Regia
- Sceneggiatura
- Star
- Pamela Early
- (as Bríd Brennan)
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- QuizIt earned the dubious honour of being the first TV programme to be cited in the British Medical Journal as having caused Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in children.
- BlooperWhen the Policewoman enters the house you can see her smiling like shes out of character.
- Citazioni
[last lines]
Michael Parkinson: The studio's... completely dark. Just... just blackness. All the lights have failed. The... the power's gone off.
[phosphorescent glow rises]
Michael Parkinson: We've... got some lights in the studio. I don't know... there's cameras, but I don't know which one's working... I mean... there are no... No camermen! I mean... it's difficult to know even if anybody's still... still with us, but if they are, this is the scene in this studio... this totally deserted studio.
[cats start to shriek in background]
Michael Parkinson: Autocue's still working...!..."Round and round the garden... like a teddy bear?"
[stiffens]
Ghost: [speaking through Parkinson] Didn't believe that story about Mother Seddons, did you? Fee... fie... foe... fum.
[cats shriek as camera dies]
- ConnessioniEdited into Screen One: Ghostwatch (1992)
The one and only time this has been shown, anywhere in the world, I believe, was on Halloween 1992. The UK listings magazine 'Radio Times' printed it's cast, crew and writer- yet it was promoted as a 'documentary'. And the British public, suitably suckered, fell for the joke in their millions.
In much the same way that Orson Welles' 'War of the Worlds' and latterly 'The Blair Witch Project' caused audiences to question their sense of reality, so 'Ghost Watch', for one wonderful October night, made screaming believers of us all. The conceit is simple- TV heavyweight Michael Parkinson hosts an evening of programmes purporting to investigate the supernatural. There are mediums in the studio, debate, and most importantly, a 'live' investigation into one of Britain's "most haunted" houses.
The casting is intelligent and spot-on; Parkinson adds gravitas, and the 'light-entertainment' faces of Sarah Greene, Craig Charles and Mike Smith just-about convince you that whatever happens, it's going to be treated in a nice, family-orientated, jokey manner. Just what you'd expect from Auntie Beeb.
And then it begins.
Writer Stephen Volk uses every gruelling modern horror cliche in the book- possessions, telekenesis, speaking-in-tongues, self-flagellation, child-abuse, things *almost* seen, satanic animals, suicide, - but, robbed of their comfortable 'Poltergeist'/'Amityville Horror' contexts, and placed into what was until a few minutes ago an edgy, but amusing 'documentary', they take on whole new levels of terror. And 'Ghost Watch' is very, very scary.
I really don't want to ruin this for anyone who hasn't seen it- but suffice to say Expect The Unexpected. Moments of extreme horror are slipped in, almost subliminally, and the cumulative effect is of a long, terrifying journey to a place you really don't want to go.
Of course the ending is silly- it has to be, to relieve the tension, and allow viewers to relax. It was, after all, a drama, a play, a "hoax" if you like. A horror film. And the best one of the 'nineties, if I were forced to make my choice.
Due to the sheer number of complaints, and the suicide of a viewer, the BBC effectively banned it from further screenings, and refused to release it on video. Further, as far as I know, they have not offered it for sale abroad.
The only way any of us are going to see it's like again, is to rely on those who recorded it at the time of broadcast, seven years ago- or hope that some enterprising foreign station buys the rights, and remakes it.
It's a terrible, terrible shame that something as powerful and clever as this should go unseen.
Steev
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