|
Post by Michael Connolly on Oct 26, 2018 13:33:57 GMT
I wonder what distracted me from finishing my little write-ups nine and a half years ago... Whatever the case, my memory of it is that it was one of those rare anthologies where I enjoyed every story enormously, with particular praise going to the stories by Michael Cox, Peter Bell and Keris McDonald. I got rather lucky with my timing and managed to pick up very nice copies of the other books in the series on eBay last year at reasonable - if not exactly cheap - prices. I haven't got the book yet but I intend to read the Peter Bell and Michael Cox stories last. I hope I'm not talking out of turn here, but while Rosemary mentioned Michael Cox's death and Shades of Darkness in the news section of the Ghosts & Scholars Newsletter, because it was at a time when she was concentrating on the work of M.R. James and his immediate circle who were influenced by him, the book was not actually reviewed. Neither was Mark Gatiss's Crooked House (ten years old now!) that has a very Jamesian episode "The Wainscoting", which she told me she liked very much. I bought the dvd at the time, and just in time going by its price on Amazon: www.amazon.co.uk/Crooked-House-DVD-Lee-Ingleby/dp/B002JPYIY8/ref=sr_1_3?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1540560677&sr=1-3&keywords=Crooked+house
|
|
|
Post by The Lurker In The Shadows on Oct 26, 2018 13:45:37 GMT
Good grief, that has shot up in price! Fairly recently you could get it new for about £6.00. I bought the DVD when it first came out, and aside from the production itself, which I really like, the extra features, the making of documentary - showing just how much was achieved on a very tight budget - and commentary track are all excellent.
|
|
|
Post by helrunar on Oct 26, 2018 15:26:31 GMT
I really liked Crooked House. I haven't seen much of Mark Gatiss's work (in general, I don't really care for current TV and cinema--but there are a few exceptions), but of what I have seen, this was the best.
I should watch it again, if I can find my DVD of it. It really did seem like a marvelous little thing when I saw it.
cheers, H.
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Oct 26, 2018 16:51:31 GMT
|
|
|
Post by helrunar on Oct 26, 2018 19:38:16 GMT
Yeah, I did watch those a couple of years ago. Very well done series.
Gatiss did a hilarious but perhaps problematic (in terms of political correctness) send-up of the Christopher Lee Fu Manchu films in an episode of this series called Dr Terrible's House of Horrible, I guess in the early 2000s. If I recall correctly, the story was called something like "Frenzy of Tongs" and had the evil Oriental mastermind address his daughter as "Spawn." So bad but so funny.
cheers, Steve
|
|
|
Post by The Lurker In The Shadows on Oct 26, 2018 20:20:48 GMT
I watched Frenzy of Tongs again recently. A lively send up of Fu Manchu, with elements of Jason King and Doctor Who's The Talons of Weng Chiang. The episode actually satirises the convention of having white actors playing other ethnicities in films of earlier eras by having a Chinese actor playing a British police inspector. Good fun, though I enjoyed the references more than most of the jokes. That said, my favourite Dr Terrible episode is the Amicus pastiche, And Now The Fearing...
I'm particularly looking forward to Gatiss's new BBC ghost story, The Dead Room, which I'm assuming will BBC Four's Christmas ghost story this year.
The Dead Room Written and directed by Mark Gatiss, The Dead Room is a chilling new ghost story for BBC Four.
Set and filmed at the iconic Maida Vale studios, The Dead Room tells the story of a long-running radio horror series and its veteran presenter and national treasure Aubrey Judd. But times are changing. Tastes are shifting. There’s a new young producer. Whatever happened to the classic ghost stories? The good old days? Aubrey soon discovers that all is not quiet in the eerie radio studio and that elements of his own past are not as dead and buried as he perhaps hoped…
Simon Callow (Victoria & Abdul, Shakespeare in Love, Four Weddings and a Funeral) leads the cast as Aubrey, and is joined by Anjli Mohindra (Bodyguard, The Boy with the Topknot, The Sarah Jane Adventures), Susan Penhaligon (Count Dracula, Doctor Who) and Joshua Oakes-Rogers (Little Crackers).
The Dead Room is a 1x30’ drama written and directed by Mark Gatiss. The Executive Producer is Ben Irving for BBC Four and Isibeal Ballance is the Producer for Can Do Productions.
|
|
|
Post by helrunar on Oct 26, 2018 22:18:31 GMT
Hi Daniel, I completely agree with you about both "Frenzy of Tongs" and Dr Terrible. My favorite in the series is a tie between the Vampire Lesbians send-up and And Now the Fearing... The segment of the latter involving a haunted, demonic Danish modern coffee-table maybe the cleverest send-up ever of all my favorite 1970s British horror anthology films. Also love the big where Sheila Walker plays a sinister Romany fortune-teller. Lovely to see Sheila (and Honor Blackman in the Vampire Lesbians segment) brought back for these.
There were a couple of episodes of the Dr Terrible series that I found literally unwatchable. I won't go into further details. I am not familiar with the lead star/writer/producer but I guess he is the modern era's answer to Frankie Howerd or something along those lines. Things like this remind me that even my Anglomania has its limits.
I have no expectations at all, at this point, about any current TV or film projects. I don't have a signal myself so I either get stuff on disc (I work for an exceptionally well-stocked academic library which collects widely now as well as having more streaming archive options than I even have time to learn about), or watch it on something like you tube.
But yeah, the new Gatiss thing sounds potentially good. A friend of mine actually wrote a story several years ago with a similar premise.
cheers, Steve
|
|
|
Post by jamesdoig on Oct 30, 2018 19:54:50 GMT
I really liked Crooked House. I haven't seen much of Mark Gatiss's work (in general, I don't really care for current TV and cinema--but there are a few exceptions), but of what I have seen, this was the best. Watched this on youtube the other day - quality wasn't great and for some reason it was broken up into 15 minute parts, but it was excellent.
|
|
|
Post by Shrink Proof on Oct 30, 2018 21:29:00 GMT
I really liked Crooked House. I haven't seen much of Mark Gatiss's work (in general, I don't really care for current TV and cinema--but there are a few exceptions), but of what I have seen, this was the best. Watched this on youtube the other day - quality wasn't great and for some reason it was broken up into 15 minute parts, but it was excellent. I saw it when it was first broadcast and thoroughly enjoyed it (I don't care for much modern TV either).
|
|
|
Post by Michael Connolly on Oct 31, 2018 13:28:53 GMT
Mark Gatiss is in BBC Radio 4's version of Robert Aickman's "Ringing the Changes" repeated on Radio 4 Extra today: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0075yw2Mark Gatiss really gets around the Vault. I think he's one of us.
|
|