Urban Ghost Story

Well the name of the film and the description on the back of the DVD, and even the tag line would have you believe this is a ghost story.

In fact what you have here is a story of a 12 year old girl in a high rise block in Glasgow who suffered a car crash where she died but was revived.

What follows seems to be more focused on her life and her mothers struggle to raise her kids in the poverty stricken area, and the ghostly elements play a very small part and the film never really takes it any further than you are expecting.

OK watch this film if you'd like to see a film about the above mentioned but not if you want a ghost story urban or not.

Finding any work with Billy Boyd here in the US is tough so finding something where Billy is credited as 'loan shark' told me he wouldn't be in it much - and he was only in two scenes. However, the story itself was absorbing, though slow or repetitive in a couple of places. There was a good amount of tension building to keep me interested. While I am not familiar with who's who in the Scottish acting world, I thought there were strong performances by Heather Ann Foster, Stephanie Buttle and Nicola Stapleton, as well as a fair turn for Jason Connery. I was quite astonished by Billy's foul mouthed character - a loan shark that has a stutter that comes out when he particularly angry. I thought he played the part well. He certainly startled me with his performance - so much anger.

Generally, I don't go in for these kind of movies and it was curiosity of Billy's previous work that got my attention. But it was the story that kept me watching.

I caught Urban Ghost Story on t.v. recently and I have to say I was very impressed. I was familiar with the film makers through their authorship of the Guerilla Film Makers Handbook but, to be honest, after reading about their first two features 'The Runner' and 'White Angel' (neither of which I have seen) I wasn't expecting great things from Urban Ghost Story.

It turned out however to be a very effective piece of film making which works just as well as social realism as it does as a genre film. The central performance, given by a young non-actor, possesses a raw, natural quality which helps to ground the film's supernatural aspects in a very well observed reality. Stephanie Buttle as the girl's mother is a real find as well, having to work hard against her natural beauty to make her portrayal of a dirt poor single mother convincing. Less impressive are the star turns. Billy Boyd is an ineffectual, stuttering gangster and Jason Connery (a questionable piece of stunt casting) does little with his role as a shady tabloid journalist. The film works hard though to create a believable locale, a Glasgow tower block, and succeeds totally. The film makers have clearly taken the Robert Wise 'Haunting' approach to depicting the ghostly activity and for the most part it works. These scenes could have done with being a little scarier perhaps but a bizarre seance scene does unnerve. Most impressive of all though is the fact that Urban Ghost Story was made for a reported £250,000. For that money they have created an atmospheric film which feels cinematic, complete with a jaw dropping explosion and stunt work. If only more British low budget film making was this adventurous. I am surprised to see that the director has not made a film in the six years since release whereas Merchant Ivory (whose films have gone largely unwatched since Remains of the Day) get money thrown at them. I only wish that more film makers like Ms Joliffe would emerge to shake up the British film industry.

Billy Boyd is the sexiest Glaswegian thug ever, I want to have his little ned babies. He will beat me and I will drink all the time and the children will steal cars and start smoking when they are seven, we will be the perfect family. I will stick by him even through his years in prison and his numerous bits of stuff on the side. This is my dream.

Jason Connery is also not bad looking, even funny German scientist dude was kinda cute. The movie was also quite good, well worth the £4.99 I paid that's for damn sure. Take a couple of characters from Trainspotting and stick them into a mix of Sixth Sense and Poltergeist. Now ramp down your expectations to British ITV movie level and you're there. A lot better than I would have expected.

This film manages to hold the attention well and is genuinely disturbing and frightening at times as well. Good performances from the cast and good direction. Obviously, the budget was pretty low but they make good use of it. One of the well-performed medium-sized roles is played by an actress who ended up doing truly astonishingly great work in The Office as an irritating and self-obsessed co-worker of Tim's. Great to see actors careers progressing especially when so well-deserved. Perhaps Urban Ghost Story did suffer slightly from a somewhat bland title. Jason Connery inhabits the role well. It did achieve a theatrical release in the UK though not of immense proportions.