After my traditional viewing of the splendid The League of Gentlemen Christmas Special (2000-also reviewed) I was intrigued to learn that Mark Gatiss had recently done a Ghost Story For Christmas adaptation, leading to me gazing at the mezzotint.
View on the film:
Coming from a Comedy background and of "updating" Sherlock Holmes, writer/director Mark Gatiss is disappointingly unable to put his old habits aside and brew an eerie atmosphere, with Gatiss instead treating the material as a Comedy, full of Snorricam shots on the flaring moustache face of Edward Williams, and grotesquely comedic extreme close-ups on Mrs. Ambrigail.
Despite running at just 29 minutes, and the original short story having the incredibly unsettling image of a moving mezzotint, Gatiss still finds room to slap on additions carelessly, which undermine the attempted mysterious mood, from getting rid of any ambiguity for the strange events by tying Williams family to the moving image, to a poorly judged, final appearance of a apparition coming out of the Mezzotint.
View on the film:
Coming from a Comedy background and of "updating" Sherlock Holmes, writer/director Mark Gatiss is disappointingly unable to put his old habits aside and brew an eerie atmosphere, with Gatiss instead treating the material as a Comedy, full of Snorricam shots on the flaring moustache face of Edward Williams, and grotesquely comedic extreme close-ups on Mrs. Ambrigail.
Despite running at just 29 minutes, and the original short story having the incredibly unsettling image of a moving mezzotint, Gatiss still finds room to slap on additions carelessly, which undermine the attempted mysterious mood, from getting rid of any ambiguity for the strange events by tying Williams family to the moving image, to a poorly judged, final appearance of a apparition coming out of the Mezzotint.