I've Seen Footage: How Ghostwatch Pranked an Entire Nation

On October 31st 1992, the BBC played its finest prank, airing 'Ghostwatch'. A special investigation in to the supernatural, which was suggested to be a live broadcast genuinely capturing the paranormal but was actually scripted and recorded previously. It aired just once in the UK, then never again. After that one night, the BBC received over 30,000 complaints, making it one of the most controversial TV shows in British history. The complaints were not in response to accidental Freudian slips or casual racism but perceived authenticity of the show in particular the host, Michael 'Parky' Parkinson's wild possession in the final moments. How I wished I was alive in '92 and tuned in to this insane event. We champion head blowers round here.

If you ask me, along with Peter Wakins's The War Game, Ghostwatch represents some of the most original, artistic, daring and thoroughly engaging uses of the medium of television. They are documents that address the potential of the art form and what can be achieved with television that can't be done with other mediums. Whereas, The War Game served as a nuclear attack hoax, Ghostwatch focuses as its name suggests on ghosts. Bizarrely, The War Game was banned before it even had chance to air and despite being made in 1966, it remained unseen on British television until 1985. Unfair because its anti cold war messages give it a great deal of weight. Convinced they should show that to all the pro nuclear weapon psychopaths. However, I can understand why they might have feared airing it as its replication of public safety videos is so perfect it could fool anyone.

Mick Jackson's Threads from 1984 was meant to have been inspired by The War Game too. Instead of public safety videos, Threads went for a more modern approach of modelling itself on soaps such as Coronation Street and Eastenders to present the 'real' of television. To cement this, it even features actors such as Reece Pinsdale, who would play Joe Mcyintyre in Coronation Street. Setting in Sheffield with real locations only freaks me out more, based on this being my current place of residence. Interestingly, many locals are as haunted by this fictional event as they are by some of the real horrific events that have taken place here. Both have become part of the city's legacy.

Prank culture extends beyond television and many cite Orson Welles's War of the Worlds radio broadcast on 30th October 1938 as being one of the first to use a live medium and reach a mass audience. In that case, it was the conversion of the H.G. Wells story in to news bulletins and regular weather updates of real locations scattered in between that were the examples of how the medium was experimented with to adhere to the principles of the 'real'.

Prank culture extends beyond television and many cite Orson Welles's War of the Worlds radio broadcast on 30th October 1938 as being one of the first to use a live medium and reach a mass audience. In that case, it was the conversion of the H.G. Wells story in to news bulletins and regular weather updates of real locations scattered in between that were the examples of how the medium was experimented with to adhere to the principles of the 'real'.

So what was it that Ghostwatch did to convince so many people of its authenticity? Two things, the casting and the tone. Already mentioned Parky being involved but another instantly recognisable friendly face was Craig Charles, the Coronation Street star and Soul/Funk DJ. Believe there were many children's television show stars on board too, so even though it was shown dead on the watershed of 9PM, some parents let their kids watch it and the younglings were left traumatised. Sadly, one disabled teenager was so convinced by it, he attributed his family's faulty central heating systems sounds in the night to ghosts and took his own live 5 days after the airing.

Ghostwatch's other strength was in its dry delivery of the reporting and when it does veer in to the supernatural there is a lot of camp. That was the genius part and you may at first think that's surely a strategy that can't work but oddly it does. A strange lesson to learn there in how you go about replicating the real. Simply, being realistic doesn't always work. It has to be in context. You have to understand the modes of production and how both television and your particular show operate. The writers and actors of Ghostwatch display such a perfect knowledge of those modes. Audience confusion of real and fantasy, stems from the fact Ghostwatch, essentially never steps out of character. It behaves and acts exactly as it should from start to finish. There are some detractors, who regard Ghostwatch as silly, missing the point entirely. It is exactly because it is silly and the reasons I've given above that it works. The silliness is its greatest strength. It's so aware of the absurdity of BBC Television.

Not since Chris Morris's 'Paedophilia' episode of Brass Eye in 2001 can I pinpoint another prank in British television that has provoked and challenged so many viewers. Amuses me how he did that as a season 2 episode 1 and they just cancelled the rest of the series instantly. If it were me, I'd probably save something so outrageous for the season closer. That way if the network does not decide to renew you another season, everything you'd done so far would have been shown. The absolute balls on Chris Morris to throw that out as a season premiere. His style on this was literally pretending to be a news anchor and somehow he managed to get the celebrity cameos he did. Appearances on that show from the likes of Gary Lineker and Rolf Harris never fail to send the head for a wobble.

Put me in charge of the BBC and more of this shit would follow. My first act would be having Ghostwatch screened every Halloween as a rite of passage. Creative found footage and mockumentaries would be a large part of the menu. You have to remember, Ghostwatch came before the wave of found footage horror like Paranormal Activity that became immensely popular after YouTube, the affordability of hand held cameras and Bush's mass surveillance. Even before The Blair Witch Project (which was able to use the internet and go beyond the recorded image)and The Last Broadcast.

Adding to this, as I mentioned, the brilliance of Ghostwatch is in it respecting the rules and models of television. The Last Broadcast was ahead of its time and was overshadowed by Blair Witch. However, its near erasure from history can also be accredited to its failure to adhere to its own rules. It's a prisoner of its own making. I feel no sympathy for it. No idea, why it's defenders seem to forget the final act, where it abandons the found footage set up, thereby destroying its purpose and mystery. This is where I respect Ghostwatch massively in its integrity.

Being part of the gonzo movement, the found footage genre is always going to remain of interest. It should be cinema at its most interesting, chewing away at itself and its own possibilities. Even as horror fans it should remain important as so many of the best works in the genre have come from faux documentary aesthetics. All those late 60s and 70s classics like Night of the Living Dead, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Last House on the Left being inspired by Vietnam news footage.

Unfortunately, we did get bombarded with these films. Couldn't tell you if the genres dead or still going. We've moved in to these A24 horrors mainly, which has produced some fine work over the years. However, it has started to get undeniably weird for weirds sake with little to say and no means of expansion. Let it be known though, if found footage is finished, I don't think it was because it was overdone, they were underexplored. Of course, in terms of volume, yes they were overdone but I'm convinced we haven't exhausted all its possibilities.

The amateurish aesthetics opened up the floor for both amateurs and studios to exploit and people should have foreseen and accepted that would happen. Losers without the tools would pump shit out like the Grave Encounters series (which does have some comedy in the way it's clearly influenced by Ghostwatch) and studios would use it to jump on audience demands, recreating the conditions of amateur filmmaking and saving money. Cloverfield being a great example of this. That's not a diss, I love that Yankee Godzilla flick with its post 9 11 analogy. Proved to be one of the better ones where the studios jumped in. Found footage even invaded non horror films like Chronicle (superheroes), End of Watch (action/police procedural) and Project X (teensploitation/comedy).

Unfortunately not everyone got the memo about sticking to the rules. Regardless, people should have foreseen and accepted all this would happen. Technology was always going to improve to the point of becoming more handheld and affordable so it was inevitable that saturation would occur.

For me, the issue lies in the fact, the genre became lazy. We became hooked on the fantasy of the real rather than the replication of the real. Essentially, as an audience we became lazy too because we started accepting too much as a new kind of film logic and in doing so, we stopped playing the game. I'm talking about actors names and characters names differing. End credits appearing. Added post production elements without explanation. All of which, results in zero justification for the footages existence. Fundamentally, filmmakers stopped asking the question, how did the audience receive the footage. Consequently, we went from what was found footage to what should be considered just handheld footage.

This genre works best when it's disciplined, playing with the modes of media and keeping its audience on their toes. Instead of playing with the medium and concepts, it just became an excuse for lower budgets and cutting corners. Once you start to accept broken rules, it's game over. Therefore, if we are to continue the game, my fellow Psycho Schradists we must return to projects like Ghostwatch and re learn the rules. Only then can we push this medium as far as it can go and maybe in the process create something truly new.