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Post by johnnymains on Dec 27, 2019 8:35:38 GMT
The worst Ghost Stories adaptation that there's ever been.
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Post by ropardoe on Dec 27, 2019 9:41:52 GMT
The worst Ghost Stories adaptation that there's ever been. You might have added "in my opinion". A lot of people disagree with you (and a lot agree). I thought it was fine. |
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Post by johnnymains on Dec 27, 2019 12:18:47 GMT
The worst Ghost Stories adaptation that there's ever been. You might have added "in my opinion". A lot of people disagree with you (and a lot agree). I thought it was fine. Surely me typing the above denotes that it is my opinion. Where did I say "the general consensus is" etc? Meanwhile, over on twitter, I've received some very interesting DM's from 'names' who hold the same opinion - they don't want to say so in public as nowadays that very act might damage opinion of them - me I don't care - Martin's Close was a dismal failure, I've seen better student films. It was lazy, drawn-out, the use of the narrator was questionable - if they had shot the story from say the prosecutor's viewpoint and excised the narrator entirely - it would have skipped along. It was a boring adaptation. Gatiss has had three bites of the cherry now - two James adaptations and one of his own original ideas. While I've been a massive fan of some of his past work and his attempts at keeping the ghost stories and Christmas tradition alive are very noble, surely it does more harm than good in the long run and stops new voices from having a go in the future if we have the BBC thinking that the only person who can do this kind of story is Mr G? |
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Post by pulphack on Dec 27, 2019 14:26:07 GMT
I didn't think it was that bad but you do have a point. Gatiss is an excellent writer but there have been a couple of times when he's gone OTT (some Dr Who and last episode of Sherlock spring to mind)and not had an editor brave enough to say 'hang on...' This is not a criticism of him, as every writer is prone to this, and it is something that TV suffers from particularly. In a different genre, it happened to John Sullivan in the '90's, and is also why a lot of writer/director led US TV can go awry after three successful and tight seasons. It's the 'can't see the wood for the trees' syndrome, and very easy to fall into (he says, never having been successful enough to have the chance!). A lot of the blame falls on producers who won't say anything for fear of upsetting the name talent.
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Post by humgoo on Dec 27, 2019 15:07:12 GMT
There were good moments but on the whole, I found it disappointing. The best moments were thanks to Mr Capaldi. I found the narrator scenes... unfortunate. I don't know any of the actors, but the lawyer is very good indeed. Perhaps because I'm over-familiar with the story (having listened to David Collings' reading of it countless times), some of the things in the adaptation don't feel right. Judge Jeffreys should be sinister, not clownish (can't imagine he does the "funny" gesture when it's revealed that Ann Clark is a natural). The narrator scenes do stick out like a sore thumb.
Certainly looking forward to heated reviews of it in the next issue of G&S.
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Post by andydecker on Dec 27, 2019 15:21:48 GMT
I didn't think it was that bad but you do have a point. Gatiss is an excellent writer but there have been a couple of times when he's gone OTT (some Dr Who and last episode of Sherlock spring to mind)and not had an editor brave enough to say 'hang on...' I don't had access to Martin's Close, but you are right. Sherlock lost much of its appeal when they began to believe in their own hype. I liked Gatiss' Who at first, but thought most of the later ones disappointing to dull. Of course they were more interesting then the thoroughly boring mess it has become, but that is beside the point. On the other hand, I just re-watched his Adventure in Time and Space dokudrama (?) a few days ago, and absolutly loved it. The adaption business is not easy, some of the diverse Agatha Christie productions were very well done, some were just terrible. I guess sometimes you just can't make weak original material better. If it didn't work in the first place ... Or you just do too much. |
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Post by johnnymains on Dec 27, 2019 17:41:30 GMT
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Post by jamesdoig on Dec 27, 2019 22:29:47 GMT
The worst Ghost Stories adaptation that there's ever been. Gee, I didn't think it was that bad, Johnny! The worst adaptation I've seen was that 2010 one of "Oh Whistle and I'll Come to You" - seemed to miss the plot completely. I didn't really mind the narrator in "Martin's Close" - what often gets ignored in the adaptations is the idea of old documents falling into the hands of a rational contemporary who relates the events in an objective way - in this case he seemed your stereotypical academic. |
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Post by andydecker on Dec 28, 2019 10:54:29 GMT
Thank you so much. I never think of Youtube. I read the story first, I have one of those Kindle compilations of James and found it there. I can share the disappointment. I thought it rather poor. The narrator alwyas threw me right out of the tale - and he looked incredibly fake - and the court was so, what is the best term? Cosy? I remembered at once the country court scene in Gunpowder, which looked much more convincing. (Even if I hated Gunpowder) Didn't believe for a moment that this was a murder process. The tavern scene was so much better in the story, here it was extremely poor. But what grated on my nerves most was how PC sanitized the content was. In the story the murderer made his sport with the unattractive, simple girl, the whole community was in on the "joke" and thought nothing on it, until she was killed, and the guy was so enraged when the affair cost him his nice rich bride that he "made use of many outrageous expressions and threatenings against her and subsequently upon meeting with her both abused her and struck at her with a whip, but she, being but a poor innocent, could not be persuaded to desist form her attchment to him", as James wrote. All of this was either ignored or just mentioned in passing or at best implied. In dialogue. What became of "show, don't tell"? This of course watered down the motive of the murder until it made not a lot of sense any longer. I understand that you don't want to have some misogynistic asshole - in a community of people who have no problem whatsoever with this behavior (or executing somebody just with circumstantially evidence) - slapping a "simple" girl around on screen, especially not in a christmas ghost story on BBC. But why bother doing this story in the first place? What was its appeal as material? If you have to cut everything which can be seen as "offensive"? I also took the opportunity to watch the other two christmas ghost stories too. There were so much better. This was a misfire. |
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Post by helrunar on Dec 28, 2019 15:17:07 GMT
Thanks for those astute comments, Andreas. I knew there was a lot missing in the film, but it's been a few years since I last read that story. The verdict and sentencing seemed odd in the film as no material evidence had been presented.
I thought the presentation of the Jeffreys character was quite poor. After my initial post, I recalled that Mark G played a Fu Manchu character in this short series that was a vehicle for Steve Coogan, Dr Terrible's House of Horrible, around 20 years ago--this "ghost story" played a lot like an episode of that, I thought. More about sending it all up than a serious attempt at horror.
Happy New Year!
Best, Steve
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Post by johnnymains on Dec 28, 2019 17:44:55 GMT
Yes, more subtlety than my comments, Andy!
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Post by David A. Riley on Dec 28, 2019 18:41:23 GMT
I'll be interested to see what everyone makes of the new Dracula the BBC are broadcasting shortly.
Will Mark Gattiss redeem himself?
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Post by jamesdoig on Dec 28, 2019 20:58:49 GMT
Thank you so much. I never think of Youtube. I read the story first, I have one of those Kindle compilations of James and found it there. Some perceptive comments there, Andy - looks like you missed your calling as a reviewer. |
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Post by andydecker on Dec 28, 2019 23:41:24 GMT
Thank you so much. I never think of Youtube. I read the story first, I have one of those Kindle compilations of James and found it there. Some perceptive comments there, Andy - looks like you missed your calling as a reviewer. Thanks for the nice words. Actually I wrote quite a few. I used to do content and market analysis for genre publishers, wrote short paid reviews for Am*zo*n in the 90s for a while (which of course was more advertising than reviewing), in the last years I did some horror series reviews for German blogs, often comparing the original and the translation. And some work for Mr.Mariott, which is always fun (and a challenge to do in a foreign language :-) ) |
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Post by jamesdoig on Dec 29, 2019 5:35:52 GMT
And some work for Mr.Mariott, which is always fun (and a challenge to do in a foreign language :-) ) Hopefully you've got some reviews in Justin's Pulp Horror due out in the New Year. |
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