Ghostwatch (1992)

 ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Ghostwatch (1992) – L. Manning

Perhaps this has gone down in the annals of “seemed like a good idea at the time” events but even now it managed to pack a punch, 28 years later.  So, yes, the BBC decided to make a faux live broadcast (hosted by Michael Parkinson no less) where they station a reporter and camera crew in a supposedly haunted house and film what happens on Halloween.  In the studio is an expert on parapsychology and interviewees include a skeptic from New York City.  Of course, weird things do begin to happen, centered on a young girl nearing puberty.  Apparently, many Brits tuned in late (after a movie on ITV finished) and did not realise that the broadcast was staged & fictional – so the outcry and shock resembled what happened after Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds radio broadcast in the 1930s.  In practice, the film feels a bit like the subsequent Blair Witch Project with its “you are there” shaky cam and inexplicable chaos.  Apparently, if you look closely enough you can see the apparition (that callers to the show’s hotline were reporting) approximately 13 times – I only saw it once after being told where to look!  I knew it wasn’t real but still I had to keep pinching myself…