“Ghostwatch” Pranked A Nation On Halloween Night
The found-footage genre is a staple of modern horror, for better or for worse. It isn’t always used effectively, but when it works, it’s because the “real” quality of the amateur-looking footage does a better job at fooling your mind. Most people think the first successful use of this trick was The Blair Witch Project, but as Mental Floss reports, the lads across the sea beat US filmmakers to the camcorder seven years prior.
Screenwriter Stephen Volk had an idea for a TV series that was half-horror, half television satire. The program (or “programme”) would follow a fictional ghost-hunting crew in a “real” documentary format, much like the lame ghost-chasing reality shows that run today on channels you don’t watch. In the last episode, this team would encounter a real ghost and the tone of the show would shift suddenly into outright horror.
The BBC was skeptical such an idea could hold the audience’s interest long enough to make it to the payoff. They greenlit Volk’s show, but only as a 90-minute TV movie based on the script for the last episode. It would take the form of a news special titled “Ghostwatch,” hosted by familiar anchors and reporters from the BBC news crew.
Much care was taken to make things look as authentic as possible. The reporters visited a house “live” that was reported to be haunted while the crew on the “Ghostwatch” news set took calls from listeners. These were all fake, but the show never let you know. Once the special was half-over, the bag of tricks started appearing: strange noises, sudden jump scares, and — eventually — possessions. A familiar batch of boos, but with a very effective twist…by using familiar visual elements BBC viewers trusted, in what appeared to be live news footage, their guard had been let down. Everything here looked like it was happening.
Volk’s inspiration was Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds radio play, which wound up convincing some of its listeners that an alien invasion was taking place. Perhaps he took that inspiration a little too far in Ghostwatch, because it had the same effect. Reports came in across England of people terrified they had just seen proof of malicious ghosts. One pregnant woman was driven into labor, while another man reportedly “soiled his trousers.” There was even rumor of an 18-year-old committing suicide over the show, but that story was never proven.
As a consequence of the negative reactions, England’s Broadcasting Standards Council ruled that the BBC hadn’t cushioned Ghostwatch with enough warnings that it wasn’t real. The movie was banned from ever airing again, and to this day has only appeared once…but it has a massive fanbase as a result of all this. It’s currently for sale on DVD from BBC Video.