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Gef The Talking Mongoose (The Dalby Spook)

catseye said:
I'm a bit on the fence over this one. I suspect Voirrey may have been on the ASD spectrum - I'm not quite sure why or what gives me that feeling but some things that she said just made me wonder. And that she conjured up Gef (whether literally or figuratively) to keep her company, be a guardian, to distract her parents' attention from her. And making a film about a young girl's loneliness, isolation and possible undiagnosed mental health problems, then making it a 'comedy' just doesn't sit right with me.
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Yeah I never found the Spook very funny; irritating, abusive and a bit sinister, if anything.

My own feeling, if we're looking at non-parapsychological explanations, is that there might originally have been a small animal that temporarily took up residence in the outbuildings - perhaps an escaped domestic ferret. Margaret developed the 'trick' of giving it a voice to amuse her imaginative, lonely daughter and possibly to play a trick on her husband, who comes across as an emotionally domineering sort at the very least. Many of the "Spook's" utterances seem to express specific anger and resentment towards Jim ("turn your head, you bastard, I cannot stand your eyes").

The two things that then happened, by which time the ferret itself had moved on, were that a) Jim believed what was happening and became utterly invested in the deception and b) the shared family 'game' became a public matter.

By the end of things I think the deception was largely being carried on by Voirrey, who still wanted to please her father enough to perpetuate it. I think the above explains it but also sits with Voirrey's slightly cryptic comments late in life.
 
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I've been reading the article in the latest FT regarding the film, and something struck me, which then, of course being a novelist, I ran with.

It's just a theory, a 'what if', but I don't know if it's been considered, but...

what if Voirrey wasn't Jim's daughter, but his granddaughter? Their son and daughter were mid and late teens when Jim and Margaret moved to the Isle of Man, where Voirrey was born about a year later. What if...what if they actually moved there because the daughter, Elsie, was pregnant? And they wanted to keep it quiet, so they moved to Man, where Margaret had some connections. So (in my alternate universe), Elsie gives birth to Voirrey and always intends to claim her as her daughter and move back to the mainland. But when Voirrey was 11, her uncle/brother moved away to London and then her mother/sister moved to Liverpool - without taking her. Even if Elsie had been Voirrey's sister, surely it would be natural for her to take her sister off Man and away to somewhere she could have proper schooling and friends, rather than being stuck in the middle of nowhere?

Anyway. Suppose Elsie told Voirrey that she would send for her. But didn't. And then, after a couple of years when Voirrey realises that Elsie isn't ever going to come back to fetch her...she takes matters into her own hands to try to drive the family to return to the Mainland.
 
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I've seen the film.

Simon Pegg - great.
Sadly, the dialogue was not good. And, it was too difficult to squeeze such a complex topic into 97 minutes.
I'll be curious to see the review in FT.
 
I've seen a few reviews now and they're decidedly mixed. In fairness it was never going to be a film with broad appeal, I think. I've spoilered the following just in case.

The director / writer seems to have taken the angle of using Gef as a sort of metaphor for religious belief: according to an interview this came about because of the religious experience of a friend, which finally gave him the angle he'd been looking for on a story he'd already wanted to film. So ultimately both clues for Gef's 'reality' and for his being a hoax creation of the Irvings are there, but it's left up to the viewer to decide what they wish to believe.

While this isn't necessarily the angle on the story I'd have emphasised myself, Gef being far weirder than even this suggests, it seems a valid enough one given the kind of paranormal culture of the time from which the Spook's story emerged.

Some reviewers seem to find this a productive approach, others frustrating and/or trite. They also seem to have been a bit confused about the film's tone (quite dark with flashes of comedy, rather than a pure 'comedy' as such).
 
Just watched Nandor Fodor and the Talking Mongoose. If Fodor was alive today he would sue. They portray him as a violent alcoholic. The film is full of events that never happened, as if the story was not amazing enough as it stood. The film makers couldn't even get the Irving family's dog's name right. The film would have been so much better if they just told the story and not made stuff up and inserted non-existant characters . The Irvings themselves are glossed over and Harry Price is turned into an American. I hope there will be a proper Gef film one day. Hope the old lad goes over to Hollywood and punches the director in the bracket.
 
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It was filmed in Yorkshire and looks it - while it's scenic, it's far too lush and has too many trees for the Isle of Man.
 
lordmongrove said:
Just watched Nandor Fodor and the Talking Mongoose. If Fodor was alive today he would sue. They portray him as a violent alcoholic. The film is full of events that never happened, as if the story was not amazing enough as it stood. The film makers couldn't even get the Irving family's dog's name right. The film would have been so much better if they just told the story and not made stuff up and inserted non-existant characters . The Irvings themselves are glossed over and Harry Price is turned into an American. I hope there will be a proper Gef film one day. Hope the old lad goes over to Hollywood and punches the director in the bracket.
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Perhaps this movie will stir enough interest to inspire documentaries or more faithful adaptations. At least it'll bring Gef back into the public's consciousness.
 
lordmongrove said:
Just watched Nandor Fodor and the Talking Mongoose. If Fodor was alive today he would sue. They portray him as a violent alcoholic. The film is full of events that never happened, as if the story was not amazing enough as it stood. The film makers couldn't even get the Irving family's dog's name right. The film would have been so much better if they just told the story and not made stuff up and inserted non-existant characters . The Iervings themselves are glossed over and Harry Price is turned into an American. I hope there will be a proper Gef film one day. Hope the old lad goes over to Hollywood and punches the directo in the bracket.
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PeteByrdie said:
Perhaps this movie will stir enough interest to inspire documentaries or more faithful adaptations. At least it'll bring Gef back into the public's consciousness.
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I certainly hope so.
 
Speaking of the 'weirdness' that the new film fails to grasp, the Catling / Grisoni film above, assuming you don't mind sitting through over an hour of solid monologue to camera, is well worth watching. Incredibly creepy and psychologically tense in a way that really opens out some of the (non-supernatural) implications of the Spook

The only minor thing that distracted a bit for me was that I'm pretty sure the Irving family had Liverpudlian accents: the actor playing Jim is excellent, but does sound like he's from the South-East, other than when he's screeching disturbingly in Spook mode anyway.

Incidentally Catling and Grisoni did actually manage to track down and speak to Voirrey, although typically despite not admitting any hoax she didn't really want to discuss what happened, as she didn't want the neighbours to think she was a "weirdo".
 
PeteByrdie said:
Well, I've seen the movie on Prime. It doesn't so much take liberties as just tells its own story. Having said that, as its own story, I rather enjoyed it. I wasn't expecting to.
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Yes I've watched it now as well. It was well enough made, good acting. Its not really the story of Gef as we have been given it in the past.

Decent enough as a watch, not a Fortean classic and probably unlikely to watch it again.
 
Whilst, as lordmongrove pointed out, the movie takes a few liberties with the historical facts, it was undeniably entertaining and serves its purpose of raising awareness of the real Gef case. I particularly liked the ventriloquism sequence around the 52 minute mark.
Gef's voice, as provided by Neil Gaiman, was very different to how I had imagined it!
 
Watched the Pegg film this weekend. I’d go along with pretty much all the negative criticisms voiced above, especially the insertion of extra events and characters (although I wouldn’t fault any of the actors particularly). It was too tricksy, too pleased with itself, with all those unnecessary bits of quirkiness. As with a lot of current day entertainments of this kind, atmosphere was sacrificed in favour of lashings of smart talk. I felt like I needed to come up for air afterwards.

One big, lost opportunity occurs. As a native of the Isle of Man, Nigel Kneale must’ve heard about it all. Imagine a Gef screenplay by him; something in the style of ‘Beasts’ or ‘Murrain’.
 
Slight spoiler ahead, in case someone hasn't watched it.

Whilst the movie did heavily lean towards the hoax hypothesis, emphasising the ventriloquism, what were viewers meant to make of a drunken Nandor Fodor begging for proof of Gef's existence and being scratched?
Do most of us on this forum concur that it was all a hoax and that the movie was merely teasing viewers by throwing a bit of woo into the mix?
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
Slight spoiler ahead, in case someone hasn't watched it.
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I would have been fine with the filmmakers’ emphasis on the hoax hypothesis but, boy, did they lay it on thick. A defter crew could have made a vastly more ambiguous, intriguing (and quiet!) film from the story; something to engage lovers of spookiness and non-believers alike. Like that annoying BBC radio play from a few years back, a wasted opportunity. Gef deserves better!
 
The director was fairly clear that, as his way 'into' the story of the Spook, he wanted to make a film about belief (specifically religious belief) and the more heavily signalled hoax elements were perhaps a way of getting to grips with this.

Personally I don't think that everyone's favourite extra-clever mongoose has as much to tell us about belief as he does about isolation, self-delusion and pathological family dynamics but then this isn't the film I would have made.

Nigel Kneale would have done a great job with it, I agree.
 
BS3 said:
The director was fairly clear that, as his way 'into' the story of the Spook, he wanted to make a film about belief (specifically religious belief) and the more heavily signalled hoax elements were perhaps a way of getting to grips with this.

Personally I don't think that everyone's favourite extra-clever mongoose has as much to tell us about belief as he does about isolation, self-delusion and pathological family dynamics but then this isn't the film I would have made.
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A film delving deeply into the Irving family dynamics would be interesting, rather than the caricatures we got here. “Let’s have Mrs Irving force feed everyone with homemade pastries and speak in a common ‘talking posh on the telephone’ voice.”
 
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Nods.

Gef would be tricky to do; Hes cute and fun and yet at the same time, I think he must be one of the most terrifying entities ever.
 
Kondoru said:
Gef would be tricky to do; Hes cute and fun and yet at the same time, I think he must be one of the most terrifying entities ever.
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The illustration of his claws breaking through the ceiling in the Usborne book of ghosts! As creepy as anything film FX could conjure.
 
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