#yuletide terror: christmas horror on film and television

[marypickfords]

The Stalls of Barchester (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1971) A Warning to the Curious (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1972) Lost Hearts (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1973) The Treasure of Abbot Thomas (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1974) The Ash Tree (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1975)

“For all five of these adaptations, Gordon Clark worked with cinematographer John McGlashan and sound recordist Dick Manton, who he credits with establishing the gloomy look that would be the hallmark of the series (as well as editor Roger Waugh who edited all the original series’ James adaptations save 1973’s ‘Lost Hearts’). Central to that aesthetic were the authentic East Anglian locations that have been the inspiration for many a terror tale, even aside from those of M.R. James.

‘James lived in East Anglia—the region that encompasses Norfolk and Suffolk—for most of his life,’ explains Helen Wheatley, citing this as one reason James set many of his stories there. ‘However, there is also a broader sense of the region as being rather out on a limb, a relative hinterland, which lends itself to ghost story telling,’ she continues. ‘In James’ stories, and their television adaptations, the geography and landscape of the region—expanses of flat land, the whispering grasses of the East Anglian coast line, sparsely populated agricultural land—has a particularly haunting quality.’

This landscape is key to the series’ hauntological appeal. Scholar Derek Johnston has an extensive catalogue of writing that examines nostalgia in relation to the Christmas ghost story—and the A Ghost Story for Christmas series in particular—and notes that the Victorian middle class idealization of rural life was subverted by James’ stories, which presented the country as peaceful on the surface but a place of dark, tumultuous secrets. He also points out that East Anglia is a land of invaders and colonizers, writing in his essay ‘Season, Landscape and Identity in the BBC Ghost Story for Christmas’ that ‘The connection to the local soil and landscape runs generations deep, but it has also been built upon the remains of earlier populations, with earlier connections to that landscape, overrun by the incomers...the landscape may encourage identification with the nation, but it also emphasises how the landscape is interpreted through the history of human action upon it.’” — Kier-La Janisse, from Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television (2017).

[brokehorrorfan]

Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television will be released just in time for Christmas! You can pre-order the book from Canadian micro-publisher Spectacular Optical for $24.95.

Edited by Paul Corupe and Kier-La Janisse, Yuletide Terror offers an in-depth exploration of the history of Chistmas horror films and TV shows. It collects over 20 essays and interviews, plus a compendium of nearly 200 Christmas horror reviews

Contributing authors include Stephen Thrower (Nightmare USA), Kim Newman (Nightmare Movies), Caelum Vatnsdal (They Came From Within: A History Of Canadian Horror Cinema), Michael Gingold (Fangoria), Andrea Subissati (Rue Morgue), Eric Zaldivar (Django Lives), Leslie Hatton (Popshifter), Chris Hallock (Diabolique), Ariel Fisher (Rue Morgue), and more.

To celebrate the book launch, We Always Find Ourselves in the Sea - a new Christmas horror horror short written and directed by Sean Hogan - will be released on Christmas Eve.

Watch the book trailer below, where you'll also find the table of contents.

Table of contents:

Terror and Transformation: The Enduring Legacy of A Christmas Carol By Leslie Hatton

Ringing The Changes: Bob Clark's Black Christmas By Stephen Thrower

Christmas Shocking: The Silent Night, Deadly Night Controversy By Michael Gingold

“Protecting (Not Punishing) Billy”: Gilmer McCormick on Silent Night, Deadly Night By Lee Gambin

An interview with Christmas Evil director Lewis Jackson By Amanda Reyes

“They’re Not Working For Santa Anymore”: An interview with Elves director Jeff Mandel By Zach Clark

Christmas Campout: a Q&A with Campfire Tales co-director Paul Talbot By Eric Zaldivar

It’s The Most Cynical Time of the Year: Christmastime in Horror Anthology Television By Amanda Reyes

An interview with Fred Dekker on Tales From the Crypt's "And All Through the House" By Kier-La Janisse

Why the Ghost Story at Christmas? By Derek Johnston

Warnings to the Curious: The BBC’s A Ghost Story for Christmas By Kier-La Janisse

Robin Redbreast and BBC's Play for Today: 1970s Folk Horror for Christmas By Diane A. Rogers

A Hammer Film for Christmas: Cash on Demand By Kim Newman

“Hello, Dave!”: The Joyful Misanthropy of The League Of Gentlemen Christmas Special By Owen Williams

Our Best Tree Ever: When Experimentalists Tackle Yuletide Terror By Caelum Vatnsdal

Santa Brought a Syringe: Robert Morin’s Petit Pow! Pow! Noël By Ralph Elawani

All I Want for Christmas is You: Franck Khalfoun’s P2 By Alexandra West

Won't Someone Think of The Children? By Andrea Subissati

Santa Vs. Satan: How Santa Conquered Hell and Mars to Create Holiday Horror By Zack Carlson

Stolen Voices and Kooky Carols: Yvonne Mackay’s The Monster's Christmas By Kier-La Janisse

An Interview with Alain Lalanne, the child hero of René Manzor's 3615: Code Pere Noël By Federico Caddeo (translated by Lee Paula Springer)

Surviving the Yuletide Season: Alcohol, Physical Affliction and Murder Down Under in The Evil Touch By Andrew Nette

Apocalypse Sinterklaas: Santa Claus’ Horror Roots in European Folklore By David Bertrand

Horns for the Holidays: The Krampus Conquers North American Horror Films By Paul Corupe

Compendium Featuring nearly 200 Christmas horror film and television reviews

[horrorsociety]

YULETIDE TERROR: CHRISTMAS HORROR ON FILM AND TELEVISION announces international book tour events and dates Read More Here: https://www.horrorsociety.com/2017/11/30/yuletide-terror-christmas-horror-film-television-announces-international-book-tour-events-dates/

[savetopnow]

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[flickfeast]

A Christmas Gift Idea - Brought to Book!

A Christmas Gift Idea - Brought to Book! - Still stuck for that last minute present? Read our festive book gift guide for some frightful inspiration .....

It’s that time of year again, and with the long winter nights and Christmas Day only a weekend away, how better to spend the holidays than curled up by the fire with a good book. We’ve picked four of our favourite recent film related tomes (each with a chilling touch), which we think any movie buff would be more than pleased to find in their stocking on Christmas morning. So with a couple of days…

[moviesandmania]

Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television - book

Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television – book

Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television is a forthcoming 2017 book edited by Paul Corupe and Kier-La Janisse, published by Canadian company Spectacular Optical.

“This comprehensive new collection of essays is set to deck your halls with insightful looks at all your festive fright favourites, from the BBC’s A Ghost Story for Christmas series to Silent Night, Deadly Night(and the…

[wavemstudios]

‘Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television’ Is a Gift for Genre Lovers

http://dlvr.it/QLWlhp

[wrongarmofthelaw]

Blue, Cup, English, Read, Teacher. (mun)

Blue: Lemon Tree by Fool’s Garden

Cup: Tea

English: English. I know a few phrases in French, but I’m not very good with the language.

Read: A few chapters from Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television.

Teacher: Not really sure. I’d like to do something with writing.

[horrorphilia]

YULETIDE TERROR: CHRISTMAS HORROR ON FILM AND TELEVISION - Book Trailer and Tour Dates Included!

Click url above to read more...

[marypickfords]

The Stalls of Barchester (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1971)

“James had a genius for imbuing objects from the past with implacable malignity. The bronze whistle in “Whistle and I’ll Come to You”, the Saxon Crown in “A Warning to the Curious”, the Mappa Mundi in “Mr. Humphry’s Inheritance” and so on. Hitchcock claimed that his “Macguffin” could be anything or nothing so long as people were prepared to kill for it, and perhaps that’s why some of his films are compelling but ultimately empty constructs. James’ objects are truly frightening because they resonate with our deepest and oldest fears about what lurks in the darkness outside the comfort and light of the tribal campfire. A whistle blown could summon who knows what fears, or perhaps a terrifying storm, a crown buried in a coastal barrow was a sacred guardian against invasion and to remove it earns the ultimate punishment, and when Haynes sits in the Archdeacon’s throne in the choir stalls for the first time he puts his hand on the carved figure of a crouching cat that adorns his armrest, and his fate is sealed.” — Lawrence Gordon Clark, quoted in Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television (2017), edited by Kier-La Janisse.

[saviorgaming]

YULETIDE TERROR: CHRISTMAS HORROR ON FILM AND TELEVISION – Book Trailer

[montrealrampage]

Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Teleivion Indiegogo Campaign

Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Teleivion Indiegogo Campaign

CHRISTMAS: the holiday, the celebration, the political battleground, is all about presents, shopping, religious and cultural othering, and a whole bunch of things for all people.

Canadian micro-publisher, Spectacular Optical, is coming out with their take on Christmas, with a compendium of essays, stories, and reviews on Christmas Horror in film and television. Titled, Yuletide Terror: Christmas…

[savetopnow]

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[marypickfords]

A Warning to the Curious (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1972)

“Gordon Clark followed up “The Stalls of Barchester” with “A Warning to the Curious” (1972). Coming straight off Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs, British character actor Peter Vaughan stars as an amateur archaeologist who is followed by a malevolent force after he uncovers one of the mythical three crowns that protect the Suffolk coastline (although it was actually filmed in Norfolk). “A Warning to the Curious” is perhaps the closest Gordon Clark came to the brooding stillness of Jonathan Miller’s “Whistle and I’ll Come to You”, with its emphasis on coastal exteriors, the obsessive intensity of the central character and the dark spectre that dogs him at every step.” — Kier-La Janisse, from Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television (2017).

[marypickfords]

The Ash Tree (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1975)

“I made, then, three trials, opening the Book and placing my Finger upon certain Words: which gave in the first these words, from Luke xiii. 7, Cut it down; in the second, Isaiah xiii. 20, It shall never be inhabited; and upon the third Experiment, Job xxxix. 30, Her young ones also suck up blood.” — MR James, The Ash-Tree, from Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (1904).

“Further physical abominations were on display in follow-up ‘The Ash Tree’ (1975), starring Edward Petherbridge (later to show up in Gordon Clark’s own version of James’ ‘Casting the Runes’ for ITV in 1979) as an aristocrat who is plagued by his ancestor’s execution of a local witch decades earlier. Adapted by renowned English playwright David Rudkin, who similarly explored Britain’s pagan past in the acclaimed Penda’s Fen the year previous, ‘The Ash Tree’ is the shortest of all the installments, but somehow seems the longest, and its protracted sequences in bright daylight fall aesthetically flat. But the film comes alive at night, as the deformed spiders birthed by the witch’s curse scurry about in the darkness, providing the protagonist—and the film—with a tangible sense of twitchy anxiety. While the main house and grounds were filmed elsewhere, ‘The Ash Tree’ of the title was actually filmed on Gordon Clark’s own property, and mysteriously died two years after filming.” — Kier-La Janisse, from Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television (2017).

[marypickfords]

The Treasure of Abbot Thomas (Lawrence Gordon Clark, 1974)

“‘The Treasure of Abbot Thomas’ (1974) is the most ripping mystery of the bunch, starring Michael Bryant as a theologian who teams up with a young posh protégé to try to uncover a treasure allegedly hidden on the Abbey grounds. Bathed in blue and black hues, with the chameleonic Bryant practically unrecognizable from both Girly and The Stone Tape in the years previous, the adaptation moves the action from Germany to Somerset’s Wells Cathedral where it incorporates the famous 14th century stained glass 'Jesse Window' as part of the mystery. [...] The stained glass operates as something of a map, with clues leading to the Abbot’s treasure, which (as in A Warning to the Curious) is guarded by a supernatural being” — Kier-La Janisse, from Yuletide Terror: Christmas Horror on Film and Television (2017).