Whistle and I’ll Come to You (2010)

James Parkin, having recently placed his wife into a nursing home, decides to head to one of their old haunts to try and recapture some sense of their past together.

This loose but interesting adaptation of the M.R. James short story is about loss. Loss of the wife he knew, loss of mental faculty, loss of time and place, loss of what was.

The small cast consisting of John Hurt, Gemma Jones, Lesley Sharp and Sophie Thompson are, as expected, terrific. There's a bit too much over-reliance on spooky objects for my liking and the ending is pretty obvious but this adaptation is very good nonetheless.

I have one whinge. Why doesn't the title sequence mention M.R. James? Is says "Written by Neil Cross" but there's no "Adapted from", "Based on" or anything! The only mention is in the credits, which, as far as I'm concerned, is not enough.

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Number 13 (2006)

How the opening of a hidden letter can seal a man's fate. A tale of curses, witchcraft and a missing room.

Whereas in previous adaptations, James's heroes/victims tend to be, with a few exceptions, fairly likeable academics caught up in their own little world, this time we have Greg Wise as Professor Anderson, an egotistical and supercilious historian. An easy man to dislike and to help us there's lawyer and bon vivant Edward Jenkins (played by Tom Burke), acting as a foil and irritating Anderson with his every act. David Burke makes a welcome return as the hotel landlord after his appearance in the previous A View From a Hill.

More heavy-handed (the sound design isn't exactly subtle and the feel of the film is reminiscent of The Haunting) than A View From a Hill but this works in the film's favour, slowly building the tension until the quite physical conclusion and the cracking of an Oxford don's empiricism. Good stuff!

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A View from a Hill (2005)

Onwards to the newer, revival Ghost Stories for Christmas and backwards to M.R. James.

Museum curator, Dr. Fanshawe, borrows a pair of binoculars seem to show scenes from the past and thus starts a tale of the dissolution of the monasteries (nicely linked to the decline of the aristocracy in the early 20th century), obsession, hangings and rural horror.

Casualty's Mark Letheren puts on a good show as the uncomfortable fish-out-of-water Fanshawe. Pip Torrens as the local squire reminded me a bit of Hugh Laurie's characters from his days in Fry & Laurie and as Bertie Wooster. David Burke deserves a special mention as the stoic butler, Patten who provides the much-needed clues that bring past deeds to light.

There's some nice photography that captures the feel of the countryside in late winter (the Gorse is flowering) and the claustrophobic terror that a night in the woods can bring. For a change, we get good production values and some great props. It's also nice to see that they seem to get James's occasional and subtle humour.

While not particularly grisly, A View From A Hill is a fine James adaptation and a worthy start to the short Christmas Ghost Story revival.

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The Ash Tree (1975)

Oh, yea!, Oh, yea! Oh, yea!
Local squire desecrates grave!
Curse wreaks havoc with wildlife!
Buxom wench suspected of witchery!

A fine and haunted performance by Edward Petherbridge as the Squire. Lalla Ward makes an all too brief appearance. A good, solid entry in the series with a killer ending that bumps it up a half-star.

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The Treasure of Abbot Thomas (1974)

A treasure hunt involving codes, in a monastery filled with cowled monks reciting Latin (and we all know how spooky Latin can sound). You know what this is, don't you? The Treasure of Abbot Thomas is a Dan Brown adventure! That is, if Dan Brown were any bloody good, it would be.

Again, a great cast, including the always spooky Anne Blake, but this time led by the wonderful Michael Bryant; whose character, while not as shouty as in The Stone Tape, is still very much assured in his beliefs.

The film captures the gentle humour in James' stories very well. The "slab cake" scene was hilarious. Plus there's a rather nice debunking of that most favourite of Victorian pastimes - a seance!

I do find it funny it's always M.R. James' religious characters who are supposed to be the rationalists :)

A rollicking good story with a few good scares!

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Lost Hearts (1973)

Eleven-year-old Stephen moves to stay with his elderly cousin, Peregrine Abney, in a remote country house but will he reach his next birthday?

Spooky in that Water Babies/Secret Garden sort of way and containing some startling imagery but badly let down by the clownish performance of Joseph O'Conor as Peregrine Abney, who displays the sort of forced eccentricity you'd get in a bad Dickens adaptation. Lost Hearts would have scared the hell out of me when I was a kid but now? Not so much.

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A Warning to the Curious (1972)

Atmospheric, steadily-paced, filled with dread and pretty gruesome for a TV adaptation of a James story, with a grisly billhook death at the very start.

Peter Vaughan leads a fine cast and is wonderfully understated as the down-at-the-heels, amateur archaeologist Mr. Paxton (it's always a treat to see Grouty in anything). After the previous year's The Stalls of Barchester, Clive Swift makes another appearance as the scholarly Dr. Black, subtly linking both stories. Make no mistake though, this is the far superior effort. Also worth a mention is Roger Milner as the odd antique shop owner.

A Warning to the Curious has one of the best scores I've ever heard, let alone on a television programme. Full of droned dissonance and rasping breathing that reminded me of the Nick Cave and Warren Ellis collaborations. Fucking brilliant!

Is it as good as Whistle and I'll Come to You? Maybe, maybe not, but it is a top-tier Christmas Ghost Story. Thank you, BFI for saving these wonderful programmes from the clutches of the ever negligent BBC.

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The Stalls of Barchester (1971)

A Poe-like tale of murder, blackmail and guilt. A straightforward telling but tense, with a real sense of foreboding and filled to the brim with spooky details.
Good to see a Hyacinth-less Clive Swift, expert on the longbow, Robert Hardy and an extremely snotty Thelma Barlow.

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The Signalman (1976)

In which isolation, confinement and impotence can light cinders in the darkest corners of the mind, cause vibrations in the soul and signal the most terrible of horrors.

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Whistle and I’ll Come to You (1968)

An academic old duffer pipes open the doors of perception and peers into the unknown.

Michael Hordern in an M.R. James ghost story, directed by Jonathan Miller. What's not to like? Beautifully unnerving although I kept expecting Hordern to exclaim "Bear!".

Nope-Tober: Random Shit for an Ill-disciplined Mind

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