The Canterville Ghost

I liked this version okay, but my favorite "Canterville Ghost" is the one 10 years before this one-- the 1986 version with Alyssa Milano and Sir John Gielgud. The 1986 movie was much better and more exciting than this one... More scary and funny things happened in it. I also thought they bothered to do better "ghostly" special effects. But the 1996 one is definitely worth seeing, none the less... It's a nice story and I thought that Patrick Stewart and Neve Campbell did a good job. The little brothers were annoying though in this one, and completely un-necessary to the movie. But the castles and the english scenery are so pretty in both. The music was much better in the 1986 version though.. even the opening scene was nicer of them going up to the castle in the horse drawn carriage, rather than in a car. So it's those little details that make the one a decade earlier a lot better than this one.

Fore I did in fact enjoy this.

Its not everyday that after years of watching thousands of movies, shows and anime from across the decades from the turn of the century with black and white silent flicks, to modern crud or the odd good modern film. I am not going to pretend I am some great critic that writes like a poet, but this film, though made for tv, was good. IT had the super talented and entertainment Sir Patrick Stewart, Neve Campbell back in her super cute early 20s, and a relatively funny "newer" version of one of Oscar Wilde's short stories. The irony is that this story was like the polar opposite of The Portrait of Dorian Grey, which is a storye of Wilde's I love. Yet for those not familiar with the Canterville Ghost the tale is about a different kind of immortality; stuck in perpetual pergatory and not actually being allowed to move on to heaven or hell. Just stuck in a lonely, sad, soul crushing, purposeless ghostly existence. At least Dorian Grey got to live, but he was too much of a hollow, nearly dead foppish fool. Dead on the inside as the Ghost of Canterville was in all truth and meaning of the word. BUt it was kinda light hearted as older made for tv stories were.Its got that kinda grainy lower quality look to the film from the older tech and trying to shoot scenes by actual candlelight ( with dim but noticable staged lgihting here and there too at times)...but I loved that back in the day. The story is nice and charming ina simple way that almost anyone can watch, even young children of 5+ years old. Its hardly a real horror story. And the family and myself liked it immensely. Almost an 8 out of 10 for that fine tale and ending.

Oscar Wilde's short story is here updated and given a glossy makeover in this American TV movie co-produced by lead actor Patrick Stewart. Wilde's tale is tweaked somewhat, no doubt for modern consumption, but the story of the lamenting ghost, behind whose bluster lies a desire for redemption and eternal rest still comes through in what was a pleasant and watchable piece of family entertainment.

Making good use of its Knebworth House location and employing the services of veteran English supporting actors Joan Sims and Donald Sinden as housekeeper Mrs Umney and her husband, these fustian, traditional components, along with the stentorian, Shakespeare-quoting Stewart as the ghost himself, contrast nicely with the brash youth of Mr & Mrs Otis and their young children. I might have wished for a scarier ghost and better special effects but I guess a TV movie budget is somewhat less than for a full cinematic release.

As is usual in tales of this type, there's always one disbelieving sceptic, in this case the father, Mr Otis, who for good measure appears to have seen his relationship with oldest daughter Virginia become strained as she gets older, the situation for the latter exacerbated by the family's move to England from America.

After initially encountering Stewart's ghost with to be fair, not much fear and trepidation, the children man (and woman) up enough for Virginia to bond with it and by the end lead it to peace and the expected happy ending. The device of trying to convince the father of the ghost's existence by means of the daughter and Stewart recreating Hamlet's father's ghost scene seems a bit far-fetched for modern audiences, even whilst I appreciate it is in the book. Neve Campbell does well in her scenes with Stewart depicting a young teenage girl's blossoming into womanhood, aided conveniently by the appearance of a neighbouring handsome young lord.

Purists may criticise some of the liberties taken with Wilde's original story, but sufficient respect I believe is paid in what was for me a sprightly and warming retelling of a nice old tale.

Neve Campbell and her family (small brothers, sympathetic mum, physicist and cynic father) travel from America to England when he lands a lucrative research post, and almost immediately strange things begin to happen in the de Canterville ancestry home.

Bumps and moans in the night, bloodstains, invisible hands on the shoulder - yes, there's a ghost about.

Oscar Wilde's story takes shape beautifully in this TV version, one of the numerous adaptations of his tale for children. Patrick Stewart is the ghostly Simon de Canterville, doomed to walk the house at night for all eternity for his earthly crimes, and he is watchable, especially wrestling with the pride of 400 years dead and no one to bow and scrape around him.

This being a fairy tale there's romance for Ginny as well in the shape of a local Duke (Daniel Betts) who is sympathetic to ghosts and very charming, as local Dukes so often are in these stories. Donald Sinden and Joan Sims play butler and housekeeper, shielding guilty secrets, and Leslie Philips appears briefly as the current representative of family de Canterville.

Recommended for children and adults alike, 'The Canterville Ghost' is charming, touching, and with just the right amount of suspense. The Americans may be paint-by-numbers stereotypes, but that doesn't matter. Without Stewart, I might have rated this much lower, but it definitely deserves high points for his performance alone.

Do you remember those charming, touching, romantic movies from the 40s or 50s? Can you imagine one of those transformed into a teenie film without loosing a bit of its charm? Well, it can be done, as this film proves.

It's the perfect film for an autumn evening with a fire crackling in the fireplace and the lights turned low.