The Haunting of Margam Castle

Please don't. You know you have those movies that are so bad, they're good? Well this isn't one of them.

I made the mistake of letting my wife have free reign over the tv remote tonight and this was the result. After 10 minutes she was asking to put Strictly back on. I told her I was going to make her watch this film until it finished. To add insult to injury, she then told me that she'd rented it (through my Sky account).

Just over half way through, my wife said she had to go and check on our daughter. I didn't see her again until after the film had finished.

Looking for some horror films to watch during the Pandemic, I stumbled across this hot mess. The film mixes together clunky script, extremely bad acting, and the unintentionally funny moments to make for one of the single worst horror films in recent memory. Let's take for example the scene in the pub where all the characters talk ad nauseum about what Welsh Rarebit is! My favorite moment is when the medium is "seized" by one of the ghosts, and the character's response is to say, "She's gone! We can't help her." That was a laugh out loud moment. The actors playing the ghosts seem more like children dressing up for Halloween than anything remotely scary. Unless you want to use this film for a Mystery Science Theatre party, I'd suggest you use 90 minutes for something else.

Good grief this is awful. Seriously dull monotone stilted dialogue, cringeworthy outdated cliches about the British (cue lots of comments about how we're all apparently obsessed with the weather, have terrible teeth and go misty eyed at the thought of going to America). Slow action, an entire scene focussed on a character putting her dinner in a microwave. Turned it off after half hour (the film not the microwave). Seriously don't waste your time. The first moment where it was meant to be scary we burst out laughing. We were rooting for the ghosts.

I must admit that I had hoped for just a tad more from this 2020 movie titled "The Haunting of Margam Castle" than what writer and director Andrew Jones managed to deliver.

Initially I was intrigued by the movie's cover/poster, and it did seem to be a movie that could be interesting. And with it being a horror movie dealing with a haunting, of course I was interested and had to watch the movie.

However, "The Haunting of Margam Castle" turned out to be a very slow paced and even less interesting movie. Nothing much of any worth or interest happened throughout the prolonged movie, running at such a slow pace that it almost felt like torture sitting through the ordeal.

The storyline was just downright pointless and uneventful, to be bluntly honest. And that was what sank the movie well below mediocrity, because its production level was actually adequate.

For a horror movie, the most scary part about "The Haunting of Margam Castle" was how devoid of anything even remotely scary that director managed to present to the audience. And the haunts that were in the movie didn't even feel like ghosts or apparitions in any way. So it was a very stale movie in terms of frights and scares.

The acting in "The Haunting of Margam Castle" was bland, taking into consideration that the actors and actresses literally had nothing to work with. I wasn't familiar with a single performer in this movie.

All in all, "The Haunting of Margam Castle" is not worth the effort. If you enjoy a good horror movie that gives you the chills or makes the hair at the back of your neck stand up, you should definitely watch something else, because "The Haunting of Margam Castle" is not going to do the trick.

The cover/poster brandish "the most haunted building in the United Kingdom. Well, if that was the level of haunting and ghost activity, then the UK is a pretty dead zone.

I am rating this 2020 movie a generous three out of ten stars, based mostly on its production level.

Standard research crew in a haunted house shtick flick but with less screaming. Some of the make-up is good but there's no money for special effects, only a shaking camera and flashing coloured lights. Nesbitt is a good actor, and others have potential but it's marred by scenes where the dialogue is bad and feels like lines being read at each other. This would've been better suited as a TV movie 30 years ago.