Lot No. 249

This is my least favourite of the revival 21st century BBC 'Ghost Story for Christmas' TV specials with very few admirable qualities but a range of unsatisfactory elements.

Characters are boorishly two dimensional and played with an according simplicity by the small cast. The production fails to generate a sense of authenticity which leaves it unable to function as a ghost story of a personal experience of the intrusion into the world of a malignant "other" force.

It is written in a way that suggests that initial on paper cleverness did not translate to the finished screenplay with ideas that should have been jettisoned after writing them up to a complete script being retained into production.

The mangling of a Sherlock Holmes cameo where Holmes fails dreadfully, indeed completely, at aiding a friend in need, unable to meet this request in any way leaves an odd smell behind. This is due to writing that should have not gone past a first draft.

This series seems to be running out of steam and this installment was so close to unwatchable that I couldn't imagine ever making a repeat viewing whereas some of its stablemates could sustain a second watch.

There are signs to me that the BBC can only make drama by rote, or by checklist, and that it is now a defacto Sunday School whereby the plebs can receive positive reinforcement from their social betters in the form of social morality parables delivered as inane TV programming. There is little other explanation for the writing and production decisions made in this adaptation that I can fathom, or speculatively guess at.

Certainly there is no sign of a ghost story motif in this: no sufficient effort is made to establish the normal, or natural, tempo for the world on view, as such inauthentic invasions don't seem weird and unsettling, we are just told that they are by explicit character exclamatory expositional dialogue. Without this sense of creeping weirdness into a hitherto normalcy there is no sense of growing fear, threat, menace for the suffering characters to endure in their mental experiences until the monster is finally made manifest to them and causes their ultimate dred and possibly expiry.

There is however sign aplenty that this has been put together to satisfy production criterias instigated in order to create a morally satisfactory cumulative effect on the audience: cognitive reinforcement of good and bad values. Sunday Schooling by TV drama.

As such it is both dim and dreary.

I rate at 2.5/10 because there were a handful of moments when the actors did enough with the dreck they were playing to hold my interest and suspend my disbelief enough to anticipate what will happen next in a scene. This seemed to me to be an occasional virtue of the actors rather than the writing or direction.

But honestly, aside from the decor and the resulting atmosphere, what a waste of half an hour! The story is downright simple-minded, like something a schoolboy horror fan would dream up, with no attempt to make it more believable or to explain why any of the characters behave as they do. And in the end you're left saying, "Wait. You mean, that's IT? That's all there IS?? Where's the story?"

I should add that "Oxford," as depicted in this little tale, seems to be -- even in an age before electricity -- a place badly in need of lights, since virtually all the rooms and corridors we see are shrouded in darkness.

Is it possible that a mummy, known only as lot number 249, is responsible for a series of misdemeanors at an Oxford College.

They chose a great story, suitably macabre, Conan Doyle perhaps inspired by Britain's fascination with Ancient Egypt, and all of the discoveries. Who knows what films and stories were inspired by this.

This was pretty good, more a ghost story, less of a horror, the latter could have been ramped up a little bit. Atmospheric enough, and considering the thirty minute run time, they managed to tell the story

I've read that this may well be the final Ghost story from Mark Gatiss, which is a shame, when they've been good, they've been enjoyable, this was one of the better recent offerings.

As you'd expect from this series, it looks great, and was well acted, Kit Harrington was excellent, great actor, Freddie Fox also impressed.

7/10.

Another failure from the unenterprising pen of Mark Gatiss, whose monopoly of the whole 'Ghost Stories for Christmas' brand has long outstayed its welcome. This one eschews the usual M. R. James for an adaptation of one of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's horror stories about a marauding mummy. I've read the story and loved it, but this is a pitiful attempt at an adaptation: there's no atmosphere, no depth and no workable scares at all, just a guy in bandages popping up to go boo. You can't fault the cast members, who work really hard at giving it their all, but you can fault the man response for writing and directing this tiresome nonsense.

Now, I haven't read the Conan Doyle story, but I am familiar with the story from "Tales from the Darkside: The Movie" anthology. And thus, of course I had to sit down and watch this 2023 take on the story and see what writer and directors Mark Gatiss had to offer here with this short film.

Again, while I am not familiar with the original Conan Doyle story, I don't know how true Mark Gatiss stayed to the source material, or how much liberty of rewriting he took here. Regardless, sitting down to watch "Lot No. 249" for the purpose of being entertained, I will say that writer and director Mark Gatiss succeeded in doing so.

I was only familiar with Kit Harington on the cast list in "Lot No. 249", but I have to say that the entire cast ensemble put on good performances. It was a small cast ensemble, but they carried the film well. I was also particularly impressed with actor Colin Ryan's performance.

Visually then "Lot No. 249" was good. The special effects were simplistic, but to the point and very functional. And that certainly spoke well in favor of the overall impression of the short film.

My rating of "Lot No. 249" lands on a six out of ten stars.