Wilbert Awdry WAS a fan of 'Last of the Summer Wine" so I could see how this could have been the inspiration behind 'Ghost Train". thinking about the episode itself is actually quite similar to the play's story, minus the gunrunners/Nazi sympathises part of course. then again, could there have more than lime on that cart.......
Wow, I never knew about that. But then again, many actors have very unique ancestral connections, such as Johnny Lee Miller being the grandson of Bernard Lee.
My Great Uncle, Clement Bradley, was a Conscientious Objector because of his Christian faith (he was a Methodist). He became a Stretcher Bearer in the Northumberland Fusiliers. Went out to Gallipoli where he was wounded in the leg - which he lost by degrees due to gangrene. He used a cork leg and was able to ride a motorbike. I just about remember him. Other members of my family were Quakers, so suffice to say they were also COs. ANd yet, especially since 2016, we're told that COs were cowards, anti-British, that peace is somehow 'wrong', and all that rot. They most certainly were not. #whitepoppy
Disney has just officially turned 100. For a special tribute for Disney's 100th Anniversary, you should do GAUGE TGE ISSUE: The Great Locomotive Chase, a 1956 Disney Classic based on a real event in 1862.
There's a great interview with Ridley where the interviewer says "and then you wrote The Ghost Train..." Ridley comes back swiftly "yes and people have been rewriting it ever since!" A shame the best known version meddles with the plot so much and splitting Deakin into two characters means that really the plot twist in the original doesn't make sense in the 1941 version as now they are by coincidence instead of deliberately. If I had to pick a classic railway based production to remake it would be The Ghost Train. There is easily available on here a BBC Radio Play version of it which makes for very easy listening and would make a good script for a modern adaptation without altering the original too much :) Speaking of adaptations have you ever seen the original Anglo-German silent version? Makes absolutely zero sense, alters the script almost beyond recognition and is trippy as hell!
Your video brought to mind a short film that was adapted from a Charles Dickens story from 1866. It starred Denholm Elliot as a signalman. It was adapted by the BBC, and named A Ghost Story For Christmas, it portrayed a signalman and an unnamed stranger. The short film focuses on a tunnel entrance near the signal box and a ghost train. Great to see GTI again. Thanks for another great presentation Chris, I look forward to more, if you can.
In Buster Keaton's silent epic 'The General', Keaton's character is dismissed from signing up in the U.S. army without the legit reason being ever given to him, and even then we knew he was mostly adamant he would appease his loved one. I find Arnold Ridley being demobbed only to be ridiculed to similarly amplify he had no way to justify himself other than his injured feelings. As it was before the full extent of the conditions encountered on the frontlines became apparent too, it was disorienting that by the time sympathy was being expressed, Ridley was just seen as one of many by almost everyone. In being finally firmly recognised as the dear man he was in 'Dad's Army', it must have nevertheless come as a surprise as much to him as anyone else when the connection between him and 'The Ghost Train' was assured. Regards, Samuel Farris.
"Aye thang yaw!" (Yes folks, you knew that inevitable catchphrase was coming your way!) Good ol' Arthur Askey. Little innuendo here and there occasionally, granted, but not so full of dirty jokes like some of today's comedians (not all of them by any means, just saying)... And of course, good old Arnold Ridley too. Poor chap had a rough deal, but came out good as Pvt. Godfrey... Thanks for another intriguing GTI!
Is this the movie that shot on the same old line as the Titfield Thunderbolt? I can’t remember which adaptation it is, but I think it’s surreal to see the Titfield-Mallingford line in a different way.
There was a child version in my school library in the form of a comic chaptor book. With the train and story the same, but instead of passengers stranded it was an old station turned into a house.
Arthur Askeys humour makes me want to cringe. I doubt that if he was about today he would get any laughs. It goes to show dated humour can become. Certain scenes from the Carry On films aren’t funny any more.
Thankfully the 1931 film was rescued just in time to save it, bar about the first six or seven minutes, and is on youtube. The railway sequences, filmed on the Limpley Stoke to Camerton line, are actually longer, and more dramatic than the Askey version - there's a pitched gun battle between the IRA(?) and police, and a good few more run-pasts with the Dean Goods, all of which were omitted from the later film. The bridge sequence was filmed at Arthog, opposite Barmouth, using the swing bridge and viaduct, with some pretty smart model work, transitioning from the real train to a very good model for the actual crash. (The still, of the train going off the bridge, isn't from the film - it looks like a Hornby 501 class engine!) The earlier film version, oddly, was made in Germany during the silent era, and is best described as a VERY strange production!
Tommy Gander in the 1941 film, yes. But Teddy Deakin in the original play. The role of Teddy from the original was split between Askey and Murdoch in the film
This has actually become one of my favorite old horror films. I am exactly the sort of person who adores Askey's comedy style, very reminiscent of Harold Lloyd and the Marx Brothers. And the comedy serves to only heighten the slowly growing tension and dread, a dread that doesn't go away once the twist is revealed. And compared to the stage play version, the film's ending contains almost a twist within a twist in which the events of the ghost story kind of play out twice, once for fake and then once for real.
@@borderlands6606 I actually don't find him all that annoying, really. I've certainly seen a lot worse, at any rate. And he's not a useless character by any means like a lot of comic relief might be in his position.
Despite being a long time Dad’s Army fan, I have to admit I didn’t know how much Godfrey’s story was close to his own. Really good video Chris!
Wilbert Awdry WAS a fan of 'Last of the Summer Wine" so I could see how this could have been the inspiration behind 'Ghost Train". thinking about the episode itself is actually quite similar to the play's story, minus the gunrunners/Nazi sympathises part of course. then again, could there have more than lime on that cart.......
Fun Fact: Arnold Ridley's Grand Niece is Daisy Ridley of Star Wars fame
Wow, I never knew about that. But then again, many actors have very unique ancestral connections, such as Johnny Lee Miller being the grandson of Bernard Lee.
My Great Uncle, Clement Bradley, was a Conscientious Objector because of his Christian faith (he was a Methodist). He became a Stretcher Bearer in the Northumberland Fusiliers. Went out to Gallipoli where he was wounded in the leg - which he lost by degrees due to gangrene. He used a cork leg and was able to ride a motorbike. I just about remember him. Other members of my family were Quakers, so suffice to say they were also COs. ANd yet, especially since 2016, we're told that COs were cowards, anti-British, that peace is somehow 'wrong', and all that rot. They most certainly were not. #whitepoppy
"And every year on the date of the accident, it runs again, plunging into the gap, shrieking like a *_lost soul!"_*
It actually wouldn't surprise me if this was the story that inspired the Rev. Awdry, the very "pretend ghost" that Percy's driver saw on television.
Percy, what are you talking about?
Percy,
What are you talking about?
@@mikesbricks9214 The ghost train! Driver saw it last night!
It makes my wheels wobble just to think of it
I guess this could have been what Percy’s driver saw on telly.
That's always been my assumption
This just makes me think we need more ghost train stories in media.
Disney has just officially turned 100. For a special tribute for Disney's 100th Anniversary, you should do GAUGE TGE ISSUE: The Great Locomotive Chase, a 1956 Disney Classic based on a real event in 1862.
There's a great interview with Ridley where the interviewer says "and then you wrote The Ghost Train..." Ridley comes back swiftly "yes and people have been rewriting it ever since!" A shame the best known version meddles with the plot so much and splitting Deakin into two characters means that really the plot twist in the original doesn't make sense in the 1941 version as now they are by coincidence instead of deliberately. If I had to pick a classic railway based production to remake it would be The Ghost Train. There is easily available on here a BBC Radio Play version of it which makes for very easy listening and would make a good script for a modern adaptation without altering the original too much :) Speaking of adaptations have you ever seen the original Anglo-German silent version? Makes absolutely zero sense, alters the script almost beyond recognition and is trippy as hell!
Your video brought to mind a short film that was adapted from a Charles Dickens story from 1866. It starred Denholm Elliot as a signalman. It was adapted by the BBC, and named A Ghost Story For Christmas, it portrayed a signalman and an unnamed stranger.
The short film focuses on a tunnel entrance near the signal box and a ghost train.
Great to see GTI again. Thanks for another great presentation Chris, I look forward to more, if you can.
It's a great story. I've both read it and listened to it as a podcast.
In Buster Keaton's silent epic 'The General', Keaton's character is dismissed from signing up in the U.S. army without the legit reason being ever given to him, and even then we knew he was mostly adamant he would appease his loved one. I find Arnold Ridley being demobbed only to be ridiculed to similarly amplify he had no way to justify himself other than his injured feelings. As it was before the full extent of the conditions encountered on the frontlines became apparent too, it was disorienting that by the time sympathy was being expressed, Ridley was just seen as one of many by almost everyone. In being finally firmly recognised as the dear man he was in 'Dad's Army', it must have nevertheless come as a surprise as much to him as anyone else when the connection between him and 'The Ghost Train' was assured. Regards, Samuel Farris.
Time for a new verison of ''The Ghost Train''. Don't forget ''Oh, Mister Porter'' is based off the play
The same veteran Ford Model T bus turns up in both the Askey film and Oh, Mr Porter!
"Aye thang yaw!"
(Yes folks, you knew that inevitable catchphrase was coming your way!)
Good ol' Arthur Askey. Little innuendo here and there occasionally, granted, but not so full of dirty jokes like some of today's comedians (not all of them by any means, just saying)...
And of course, good old Arnold Ridley too. Poor chap had a rough deal, but came out good as Pvt. Godfrey...
Thanks for another intriguing GTI!
Is this the movie that shot on the same old line as the Titfield Thunderbolt? I can’t remember which adaptation it is, but I think it’s surreal to see the Titfield-Mallingford line in a different way.
Yes. The 1931 film was shot on the Limpley Stoke to Camerton line; the Askey version used clips from the earlier picture.
Still waters run deep x
6:07 oh Chris, if only you knew what’s going on these days and what almost happened
What is going on? All I know is the Disney corporation's spat with the state of Florida, and the writers' and actors' strikes...
I've seen this play recently. It was very good. It had a couple of TV stars in it. Didn't know Arnold Ridley wrote it.
There was a child version in my school library in the form of a comic chaptor book. With the train and story the same, but instead of passengers stranded it was an old station turned into a house.
Arthur Askeys humour makes me want to cringe. I doubt that if he was about today he would get any laughs. It goes to show dated humour can become. Certain scenes from the Carry On films aren’t funny any more.
I understand that Ridley came up with the story when he spent a night at a train station after missing the last train
finally! been waiting for a while to see you talk about this film for a long time...
He was also at Brooklands as a driver of Racing Cars!
Thankfully the 1931 film was rescued just in time to save it, bar about the first six or seven minutes, and is on youtube. The railway sequences, filmed on the Limpley Stoke to Camerton line, are actually longer, and more dramatic than the Askey version - there's a pitched gun battle between the IRA(?) and police, and a good few more run-pasts with the Dean Goods, all of which were omitted from the later film.
The bridge sequence was filmed at Arthog, opposite Barmouth, using the swing bridge and viaduct, with some pretty smart model work, transitioning from the real train to a very good model for the actual crash. (The still, of the train going off the bridge, isn't from the film - it looks like a Hornby 501 class engine!)
The earlier film version, oddly, was made in Germany during the silent era, and is best described as a VERY strange production!
The Camerton branch was also where the Titfield Thunderbolt was filmed!
It’s a very aged story indeed
Great film as always but just for reference it was Tommy Gander who pulled the chord not Teddy Deakin.
Tommy Gander in the 1941 film, yes. But Teddy Deakin in the original play. The role of Teddy from the original was split between Askey and Murdoch in the film
This has actually become one of my favorite old horror films. I am exactly the sort of person who adores Askey's comedy style, very reminiscent of Harold Lloyd and the Marx Brothers. And the comedy serves to only heighten the slowly growing tension and dread, a dread that doesn't go away once the twist is revealed. And compared to the stage play version, the film's ending contains almost a twist within a twist in which the events of the ghost story kind of play out twice, once for fake and then once for real.
Askey's character is meant to be annoying in The Ghost train, so it's funny that people are annoyed by him.
@@borderlands6606 I actually don't find him all that annoying, really. I've certainly seen a lot worse, at any rate. And he's not a useless character by any means like a lot of comic relief might be in his position.
Pretty apt that this comes out during Storm Babet
“It’s a far far wetter thing I go through!!”
the theme music has changed? im not sure whether or not i prefer the new theme