'Ghost Story' is a pseudo-surrealist and dreamlike film. The plot is quite simplistic in a technical sense. In the 1920s or early 1930s, McFadden (Murray Melvin) invites two fellow university students to his mansion. One is Talbot, a somewhat nervous and mild fellow, and another more forceful and rude friend who leaves the house earlier in the film as his relationship with McFadden - more of an acquaintance than a real friend - doesn't really warrant him staying in a place he obviously finds uninteresting.
Talbot, on the other hand, does stay and experiences ghostly occurrences involving a Victorian doll and ''dreams'' of an insane asylum which is the key to haunting's in McFadden's newly inherited mansion.
The film is low-budget but well directed by Stephen Weeks, a very underrated filmmaker who also filmed 'I, Monster' which was one of the closer adaptations of R.L. Stephenson's 'The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde'. The films have similarities and differences. Whilst 'I, Monster' was quite straight forward in its direction, 'Ghost Story' had more surrealist touches woven into its imagery; scenes often jump back and forward from the world of dreams to reality, blending together creepily. In fact the film itself is rather dreamlike with interesting camera work and photography which, when mixed with the imagery of the Victorian doll and the scenes of the asylum, make the film unsettling and disturbing. The filming location was in Tamil Nadu Indian, though the locations chosen pass for very beautiful, yet eerie locations that are found in England.
Another interesting aspect of the film is that it was co-written by Rosemary Sutcliff, more famously a writer of historical fiction, most famously the tremendously popular 'The Eagle of the Ninth', and Philip Norman, an author and playwrite most famous for his biography of the Beatles 'Shout!: The Beatles in Their Generation'. The film is also of interested to fans of M.R. James and other writers of the 20s as it is set in the same era and has a similar feel to those works of literature that are now often found in omnibuses of classic ''ghost stories''.
'Ghost Story' is an underrated and nearly forgotten horror film, which beautifully paints a cinematic treat of unsettling scenes and images instead of going for shock and gore.
Talbot, on the other hand, does stay and experiences ghostly occurrences involving a Victorian doll and ''dreams'' of an insane asylum which is the key to haunting's in McFadden's newly inherited mansion.
The film is low-budget but well directed by Stephen Weeks, a very underrated filmmaker who also filmed 'I, Monster' which was one of the closer adaptations of R.L. Stephenson's 'The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde'. The films have similarities and differences. Whilst 'I, Monster' was quite straight forward in its direction, 'Ghost Story' had more surrealist touches woven into its imagery; scenes often jump back and forward from the world of dreams to reality, blending together creepily. In fact the film itself is rather dreamlike with interesting camera work and photography which, when mixed with the imagery of the Victorian doll and the scenes of the asylum, make the film unsettling and disturbing. The filming location was in Tamil Nadu Indian, though the locations chosen pass for very beautiful, yet eerie locations that are found in England.
Another interesting aspect of the film is that it was co-written by Rosemary Sutcliff, more famously a writer of historical fiction, most famously the tremendously popular 'The Eagle of the Ninth', and Philip Norman, an author and playwrite most famous for his biography of the Beatles 'Shout!: The Beatles in Their Generation'. The film is also of interested to fans of M.R. James and other writers of the 20s as it is set in the same era and has a similar feel to those works of literature that are now often found in omnibuses of classic ''ghost stories''.
'Ghost Story' is an underrated and nearly forgotten horror film, which beautifully paints a cinematic treat of unsettling scenes and images instead of going for shock and gore.