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Last week, I shared a short film from the Future Shorts collection, and here’s another one I like, a Victorian ghost story featuring Michael Sheen, of Frost/Nixon. Like the last short, it’s vaguely creepy but nothing scary happens.
I enjoy these vaguely creepy videos. Can’t blame her though, there was no internet or TV, she had to entertain herself somehow.
Awesome video.
I enjoyed that. Amazing what can be conveyed in ten minutes. Wish that were my house.
Really. The house is beautiful, what you can see of it
This was great! Thanks, nomtom! 🙂
Old fashion ghost story with a twist, loved it!!
Long white curtains blowing in the wind creep me out, comes from seeing the Cocteau’s 1946 Beauty and the Beast at a very young age. There a scene with Belle running down a long corridor with long white drapes blowing in the wind that stayed with me. The scene has been copied in many movies since.
I love that movie. Wonderful black and white.
Wow, this brings back memories! I remember reading this short story back in middle school or so and completely forgot about it, until this video. Nice job bringing it to life!
Here’s the story (pdf), if anyone wants to read it.
http://resources.mhs.vic.edu.au/shortstories/downloads/The_Open_Window.pdf
Oh, cool – thanks for posting this!
🙂
I remember reading it back then, too, Sugitomo. I believe it was in some kind of anthology of short stories, probably made especially for the classroom. My siblings and I all had to read it for school. We all loved it, and I’ve never forgotten it.
I kinda wish at the end with a mischievous directorial wink instead of young teenage long-tales, the ‘ghosts’ were, well ghosts. (and how old was Micheal Sheen in this! 🙂 )
Me too!! I love that kind of twist. Besides, that would have been fitting punishment for the young liar!! She might have been driven to sprint out of the house along with the terrified cleric. 😀
Thats the kind of kid who burns down the house and says it must’ve been her dead grandmother or her brother who was affected by ‘his father’s illness.’
She’s going to have some explaining to do at church on sunday when they see this poor guy again.
Maybe not, probably the poor guy would have been several miles away from that place, given the way he was fleeing in terror…
That mischievous little imp. She really set him up. At least, that’s how I prefer to interpret it — the other interpretation is that she’s a pathetic, mentally ill compulsive liar. Either way, she really did that well. She had me believing her too. That was a wonderfully creative ghost story with no ghosts.
That movie was made in 2004 (for some reason, I had assumed these were NEW shorts (maybe because the source is named Future Shorts?) but obviously not. The young girl is played by Charlotte Ritchie; she was 14 at the time. She was an extra in Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire (the year after this was made) and has been in several TV series — all on the BBC, I guess — including one I recognize, Call the Midwife (it must have been on PBS?). And to answer a question, Michael Sheen would have been 35 ish.
Somehow that short story got left out of my school textbooks. We had The Monkey’s Paw. That one really did have supernatural elements. This one is much more subtle. That little imp! They were still slippering girls in Britain in 1914 (or whenever). If she ever gets caught, she’ll be eating off the mantle.
P.S. (Thanks for the editing window, NTMTOM), the About page for Future Shorts says “Future Shorts has been providing a Global platform for short content since 2004,” so maybe this WAS new when they originally posted it. It wouldn’t have been on Youtube back then, though, would it? Was there Youtube in 2004?? Wikipedia says it was started in 2005, which is longer ago than I expected. So where was Future Shorts originally? Was it a film festival? Was there another video hosting site back then? Hmm.
I thought this little gem must have been made quite a few years ago – Michael Sheen looks as though he’s just stepped off the set of “Wilde”, in which he played Robbie Ross.
I was watching Mary Reilly,one of the few Julia Robert movies that I can sit through, when guess who shows up?
Like Downton Abbey in a gray misted purgatory. Similar to The Others.
Loved it….excellent storytelling and acting! The niece is one of the newer actresses on Call the Midwife — a fabulous, under-rated PBS series set in post WWII London.
I can’t tell you how upset my family is that Miranda left the series.