An original scary haunted house found footage tv-movie that tricks and treats. 

• Scare factor: ★★★★☆
• Realistic factor: ★★★★★
• Supernatural factor: ★★★★★
• Originality factor: ★★★★★
• Entertainment factor: ★★★★★

Ghostwatch is a British supernatural mockumentary horror tv-movie that was broadcast on BBC1 on Halloween night 1992. But the people who watched it didn’t know it was all fake. It stars Michael Parkinson, Sarah Greene, Mike Smith, Craig Charles, Gillian Bevan, Keith Ferrari. It was directed by Lesley Manning and written by Stephen Volk.

Duration 91 minutes.

More Halloween horror films? Check out this list.

Plot

Ghostwatch was announced as a special tv-show for Halloween. Tv-host Michael Parkinson is at the studio with parapsychologist Dr. Lin Pascoe who has observed and examined the family and the house for the past couple of months. With them is Mike Smith who’s in charge of a call center. People can call live to the studio and some calls are redacted to Michael and Lin. On location are Craig Charles who’s interviewing people outside the house and Sarah Green who goes to spend the night inside the house with a cameraman and sound recordist. Lin will also give commentary about what’s happening inside. 

The house is a normal terraced house at Foxhill Drive and mother Pamela Early and her daughters Suzanne and Kim are experiencing strange sounds and other disturbances. Kim calls the entity Pipes because he always bangs on the pipes. Dr. Pascoe believes them and thinks it’s a poltergeist. 

During the evening they get some calls about the history of the house, but also people are informing them they saw something on the footage. A figure, a man or woman, bald with dark holes for eyes and wearing a black dress all buttoned up. But because it’s Halloween they also get prank calls. 

As a matter of fact almost all the calls aren’t taking seriously by Michael and he thinks people are pranking them. Until they get one very disturbing call. At the same time things get really weird and scary inside the house. 

Inside the house everything was going fine, until they see shapes, and images of a man standing hiding. And other supernatural phenomena occur. And it gets worse as these phenomena even reach the studio. While outside the house an audience is forming and Halloween is in full swing. 

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Short Review

The tv-show was hosted by Micheal Parkinson (real name and real presenter) and he was in live contact with a crew (of course not live and not really happening), with presenter/reporter Sarah Greene (also real name and real presenter) that went inside the house and watch the supernatural phenomena. In the studio is also present Dr. Pascoe (who is an actual actress) to observe the findings of the tv-crew and to comment on it giving more background. They even had Mike Smith (real name, real presenter and married to Sarah Greene in real life and of course also in the mockumentary because they are playing themselves)) who oversaw the fake phone calls. Because people could phone in and tell their personal supernatural experiences. And in real life they did! But you can hardly blame them.

This film was very cleverly made. When it was broadcast it was said it was live tv, but it actually wasn’t. And people really believed it was a live show and that they watched supernatural phenomena on tv. The reason that it was/is so believable is how it was all set up. Michael himself is rather sceptic. Lin believes the family but also doesn’t know what is really going on. That makes her believable as well. 

The calls sound all very realistic and of course with some pranks thrown in makes it even more realistic. It’s also really smart to let the callers give them more information about the house, it’s past and about what they see on screen, instead of the presenters giving all this information. 

The house is a real normal house in a normal neighborhood. The live broadcast has some things going wrong with communication or broadcasting. They also have a brief discussion if parapsychology is a real science. And finally we learn that Suzanne was faking a lot of things. The broadcast itself feels very real, no filter. All these things add up to the realism of the mockumentary.

But some things give it away that it’s actually a movie. The switching between studio and location is too easy, too direct without any delay and then when someone has to respond to a comment, that person is already in shot and is already answering instead of with a small delay. And when Suzanne is talking to her mother whom she sees on tv while she’s in the mobile studio, they talk directly to each other without any delay, which is impossible. But who notices that when there are all kinds of supernatural phenomena going on while real actual people are hosting the show. 

At the moment when all of it is seen as a hoax, things really get scary. Not only strange things happen, and scary sounds like banging and knocking and even screaming cats, but also the appearances of Pipes. You can spot him several times. The first time you can see him in the footage recorded by Dr. Pascoe with a camcorder in the girl’s bedroom. It’s multiple callers who point him out. After that we are on our own to discover his appearances. 

Because there’s a lot of other things going on, they aren’t alerted to these apparitions. We also can spot him in the middle of the girl’s bedroom when the camera is panning. He’s also seen in the reflection of the windows in the kitchen, And we get a glimpse of him inside the closet under the stairs. And finally he’s in the studio standing on a higher deck just under a studio light, when things are really getting serious and even reach the studio. 

The last 15 minutes are the best part where it all accumulates into a very scary open ending, when the broadcast is suddenly broken off. Well, we’ll just have to read it in the newspaper what happened further inside the house and in the studio. 

It’s a very original idea that was too perfectly executed. It all looks very realistic and the people seem to act very real. In fact all of the presenters are actual presenters and use their actual names. That makes the things they do on camera more realistic too and thus extra scary. 

The story behind the poltergeist is a scary one as well and is slowly revealed. And the acting of the mother and daughters is very good and disturbingly realistic. During the movie Dr. Pascoe also has footage of her examination and tests on Suzanne which are disturbing as well and in the meantime things are about to escalate in the house. The build-up is great and the cinematography and camera work is very professional which adds to the realistic vibe. Although it looks like a tv-show that is live and going with what there are getting, it is actually very well plotted and put together turning it into a real reporting.

Finally it’s also an actual scary and a very fun watch. Even now, knowing that it’s not real, it certainly still does feel real, the way they edited it, what’s happening and what you see and the acting is just perfect. This is a real trick and treat for Halloween.