Having written and directed the first two episodes of A Ghost Story for Christmas, Lawrence Gordon Clark remains behind the camera for the third, but hands over the script-writing duties to Robin Chapman. Lost Hearts is once again an adaptation of a short story by M. R. James, but is much shorter than its predecessors at just over half an hour long. This conciseness does not however detract from its effectiveness.
Lost Hearts is different in tone to either The Stalls of Barchester or A Warning to the Curious, both of which - in true James style - saw older male characters persecuted by vengeful supernatural horrors. Instead, the story here concerns a young orphan named Stephen being sent to stay with his eccentric elderly cousin Mr Abney, who is gradually revealed to be far less genial than he first appears: here, the ghosts are out for revenge, but also to save Stephen from sharing the grisly fate that befell them.
Once again, Clark proves to be an inspired director of low-budget television terror, and once again he makes good use of the location filming, in this case the house and grounds of a country estate. His use of lots of point-of-view shots to show the glimpses that Stephen gets of the mysterious children are effectively creepy, as are the ashen-faced, unspeaking Boy and Girl, never more so than when the boy plays his hurdy-gurdy and then we see them with their hearts missing. Their climactic confrontation with Abner is stylishly shot: Clark conveys the horror of the scene whilst showing very little on screen. As in the previous episodes, the atmospheric score benefits the production greatly.
Prolific (and ill-fated) child actor Simon Gipps-Kent plays orphan Stephen and proves to be a bit wooden, but Lost Hearts benefits from a remarkable performance from the great stage actor and playwright Joseph O'Conor as Mr Abney. At first appearing to be a clichéd eccentric uncle-like figure, he O'Conor makes the slow transition from avuncular to menacing with great skill; it is his performance as much as Clark's direction that makes the eventual revelation of what happened to the Boy and Girl and why so queasily disturbing. Susan Richards meanwhile is rather wonderful as housekeeper Mrs Bunch, whilst James Mellor gives a decent performance as Parkes.
Despite the short running time of the episode, Chapman's version of James' story unfolds in an intriguing and dramatically satisfying fashion, and although on this occasion we get a rare happy ending to the tale as the Boy and Girl save Stephen, punish Abner for his sins, and then wave goodbye at the very end, the overall effect is to provide the audience with another memorable seasonal chill.
Lost Hearts is different in tone to either The Stalls of Barchester or A Warning to the Curious, both of which - in true James style - saw older male characters persecuted by vengeful supernatural horrors. Instead, the story here concerns a young orphan named Stephen being sent to stay with his eccentric elderly cousin Mr Abney, who is gradually revealed to be far less genial than he first appears: here, the ghosts are out for revenge, but also to save Stephen from sharing the grisly fate that befell them.
Once again, Clark proves to be an inspired director of low-budget television terror, and once again he makes good use of the location filming, in this case the house and grounds of a country estate. His use of lots of point-of-view shots to show the glimpses that Stephen gets of the mysterious children are effectively creepy, as are the ashen-faced, unspeaking Boy and Girl, never more so than when the boy plays his hurdy-gurdy and then we see them with their hearts missing. Their climactic confrontation with Abner is stylishly shot: Clark conveys the horror of the scene whilst showing very little on screen. As in the previous episodes, the atmospheric score benefits the production greatly.
Prolific (and ill-fated) child actor Simon Gipps-Kent plays orphan Stephen and proves to be a bit wooden, but Lost Hearts benefits from a remarkable performance from the great stage actor and playwright Joseph O'Conor as Mr Abney. At first appearing to be a clichéd eccentric uncle-like figure, he O'Conor makes the slow transition from avuncular to menacing with great skill; it is his performance as much as Clark's direction that makes the eventual revelation of what happened to the Boy and Girl and why so queasily disturbing. Susan Richards meanwhile is rather wonderful as housekeeper Mrs Bunch, whilst James Mellor gives a decent performance as Parkes.
Despite the short running time of the episode, Chapman's version of James' story unfolds in an intriguing and dramatically satisfying fashion, and although on this occasion we get a rare happy ending to the tale as the Boy and Girl save Stephen, punish Abner for his sins, and then wave goodbye at the very end, the overall effect is to provide the audience with another memorable seasonal chill.