Thoughts on a few M.R. James ghost stories

[Toby Frost]

Here is a short film based on "Oh Whistle and I'll Come To You, My Lad", made in 1956 by the North Downs Cinematograph Society. Given that it's an old amateur production it's rather good, and its dream sequence is quite like the one in the Jonathan Miller/Michael Horden version of the 1960s. It has that eerie quality of spying on the characters that you get with some older films. Well worth a look.

Watch Whistle and I’ll Come to You - BFI Player

A decade before the BBC's version of M R James supernatural classic came this chilling version from the North Downs Cinematograph Society

player.bfi.org.uk