Crew
Director/Teleplay – Mark Gatiss, Based on the Film The Amazing Mr Blunden (1972) Written by Lionel Jeffries and the Novel The Ghosts (1969) by Antonia Barber, Producers – Isibeal Balance & Richelle Wilder, Photography – David Higgs, Music – Blair Mowat, Visual Effects Supervisor – Nicholas Bennett, Animation – Nigel Coan & Ivana Zorn, Special Effects Supervisor – Paul Mann, Production Design – Chris Richmond. Production Company – Adorable Media/Can Do Productions.
Cast
Tsion Habte (Lucy Allen), Jason Rennie (Jamie Allen), Simon Callow (Frederick Blunden), Tamsin Greig (Mrs Wickens), India Fowler (Sara Latimer), Xavier Wilkins (Georgie Latimer), Vinette Robinson (Mrs Allen), Mark Gatiss (Mr Wickens), Kitty Archer (Arabella Wickens), Spike Fearn (Tom Fletcher), Elliot Levey (Mr Claverton), Sam Spruell (Bertie), Samuel Barnett (Mr Smith), Liz White (Jill Tucker), Sean Gilder (Dave Tucker), Amanda Lawrence (Meakin)
Plot
Following her husband’s death, Mrs Allen and her two teenage children Lucy and Jamie are struggling with finances. Just before Christmas, they are visited by the solicitor Mr Blunden who proposes they leave London and take up residence at the cottage adjoining the old, abandoned manor of Langley Park. They move into the cottage, dismissing the local rumours that the manor is haunted. Lucy and Jamie are walking the grounds when they are surprised to encounter two children, Sara and Georgie Latimer, in 19th Century dress. Sara and Georgie say they have taken a potion that has temporarily brought them two hundred years forward in time. They beg Lucy and Jamie to come back and save their lives. Lucy and Jamie concoct the potion and take it to travel back to the manor in 1821. There the children’s uncle has married the showgirl Arabella Wickens and the house is dominated by her cruel mother. Lucy and Jamie realise that Mrs Wickens is planning to burn the mansion to kill the two children in order to claim their inheritance and try to find a way to stop her.
The Amazing Mr Blunden (1972) is a ghost story that has gained a minor cult status. It was directed by actor Lionel Jeffries who also played the role of Mr Blunden. It came out during the great period of Anglo-Horror, although never really belonged there – it was adapted from the novel The Ghosts (1969) by children’s writer Antonia Barber and sits more as a children’s ghost story. Here it has been remade as a TV Movie Christmas special that appeared on UK’s Sky Max.
Mark Gatiss originally came to fame as one of the performers/writers in the comedy act The League of Gentlemen, which was later spun out into a cult tv series The League of Gentlemen (1999-2002) and a film The League of Gentlemen’s Apocalypse (2005). Gatiss is a longtime childhood fan of Doctor Who and wrote and appeared in a number of the unofficial video specials, wrote four novels in the Doctor Who New Adventures book series, and nine episodes of the 2005 revived tv series. Gatiss also wrote episodes of the revived Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) (2000-1), the haunted house tv series Crooked House (2008), wrote/appeared in a version of H.G. Wells’ The First Men in the Moon (2010), wrote/narrated the documentary series A History of Horror with Mark Gatiss (2010), wrote the tv movie An Adventure in Space and Time (2013) about the creation of Doctor Who; and wrote/directed the short tv movie ghost stories as part of the anthology series A Ghost Story for Christmas (2013- ). He co-created the modernised Sherlock (2010– ) tv series in which he also plays the recurring character of Holmes’ brother Mycroft; co-created the BBC mini-series Dracula (2020) in which he plays the role of Renfield; and created/starred in Bookish (2025- ) about an amateur bookseller detective during World War II.
When it comes to The Amazing Mr Blunden, Gatiss remains extremely faithful to the original. Even right down to the 1972 film’s quirky ending where all of the cast come on screen and bid goodbye to the audience and thank them for watching. The remake also features cameo appearances from Rosalyn Landor who played the 19th Century Sara in the 1972 film and Madeline Smith who was the original Arabella. The present from which the children travel back is updated from 1918 to the present-day, which cannily allows Gatiss to shoehorn in contemporary issues showing Vinette Robinson’s mother dealing with social services claims.
I haven’t seen the original The Amazing Mr Blunden for a number of years so my memory may be vague on some points. I did feel that the remake flowed much easier as a story than the original did but that may just be my faulty memory of the original. The remake doesn’t have the budget that Lionel Jeffries did, meaning that Gatiss substitutes puppet theatre tellings for the wider depictions of 19th Century England that Jeffries favoured. The remake plays as far more of a children’s/Young Adult story than the original ever did. At which it works okay but nothing too much more than that.
Despite his clear fannish enthusiasm for the horror genre elsewhere, Gatiss lacks much interest in the ghost story aspect. There are a couple of manifestations, but these are played for comic value – the children from the present scaring Arabella or haunting Mrs Wickens with floating objects. Gatiss plays the characters here for far more in the way of caricature – Tamsin Greig’s Mrs Wickens is made up so hideously she resembles Nanny McPhee and sporting an over-the-top Cockney accent where she pronounces all her ‘haytches’, while Gatiss himself plays Mr Wickens as an imbecilic idiot with dark glasses and an absurd cowlick that looks painted on.
Trailer here