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Nigel Kneale has demonstrated his predilection for ghost stories in such
distinctive television dramas as The Road (BBC, tx. 29/9/1963), Quatermass and
the Pit (BBC, 1958-59), and The Stone Tape (BBC, tx. 25/12/1972), using science
fiction trappings to update and transmogrify the form. The Woman in Black (ITV,
tx. 24/12/1989) is a much more traditional effort however, based on Susan
Hill's eponymous novel (a title deliberately evoking Wilkie Collins' celebrated
Victorian mystery 'The Woman in White').
Kneale's script removes the novel's framing device and transposes its
generalised Victorian setting specifically to 1925, while also altering many of
the incidental details. His fascination with science and technology is still
much in evidence, with references to the cinema, the fact that Eel Marsh House
has been electrified (still a comparative novelty in rural areas then) and Mrs
Drablow's use of a sound recording machine. However, many of the other elements
of the story, with its naïve protagonist sent to a remote town populated with
hostile locals, and the emphasis on churches, graveyards and ancient ruins, are
very familiar to the genre.
Pauline Moran, best known as Miss Lemon in Agatha Christie's Poirot (ITV,
1989- ), proves utterly mesmerising as the grimacing and malevolent ghost,
especially in the scene in which she swoops down on the bed-ridden hero, the
horror only curtailed through the intervention of a commercial break.
Although the villagers of the evocatively named 'Crythin Gifford' believe
that the title character is an evil spirit who murders children in revenge for
the tragic loss of her son, the film's focus on the hard life of people in the
country and the city turns her into more of a harbinger, a symbol of the cruel
fate and economic hardship suffered by many as a result of the war, with the
Depression only a few years away.
Hill was reportedly unhappy with some of Kneale's changes to her novel,
preferring the hugely successful stage version, which has been playing to packed
houses in the West End since 1989, with no end currently in sight. The ITV
adaptation, however, has been repeated only once since its initial transmission,
which is a shame as it's one of the few feature-length ghost stories made for
television that is able to sustain its length, thanks also to several fine
character studies, an intriguing narrative, some extremely well-executed shocks
and a memorably nihilistic finale.
Sergio Angelini
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1. Arrival (4:19)
