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When The Lights Went Out

M

merricat

Abominable Snowman
Joined
Aug 2, 2013
Messages
570
Just watched the film from 2012, no idea how I'd missed that one, but usually shy away from contemporary stock horror, much to my own detriment sometimes.
But I loved this, from the wonderfully accurate setting in 1974 Yorkshire to the amazing cast.
Has anyone else seen this, and what are your thoughts on the 'true story' element?
I don't particularly care about it's authenticity, but admit to being intrigued. I hadn't previously heard of this one.

What I loved most about this film was that it managed to avoid overdoing it, playing on sentimentality or producing predictably pointless jump scares. Whilst pretty frightening in parts, the poltergeist 'action' felt refreshingly convincing, and the reactions of the characters remained subtle (under the circs) and believable throughout. A really great portrayal of the early 70's era too, not shying away from typical cultural behaviours/beliefs of the time, perhaps on a par with Life on Mars in that respect. Just fantastic stuff!! (you can probably tell I'm excited to have seen this!).
 
@merricat
Haven't heard of this movie over here in the States, I'm going to look out for it!
Just watched the trailer, looks on the par with our 'Amityville Horror'!
 
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merricat said:
Just watched the film from 2012, no idea how I'd missed that one, but usually shy away from contemporary stock horror, much to my own detriment sometimes.
But I loved this, from the wonderfully accurate setting in 1974 Yorkshire to the amazing cast.
Has anyone else seen this, and what are your thoughts on the 'true story' element?
I don't particularly care about it's authenticity, but admit to being intrigued. I hadn't previously heard of this one.

What I loved most about this film was that it managed to avoid overdoing it, playing on sentimentality or producing predictably pointless jump scares. Whilst pretty frightening in parts, the poltergeist 'action' felt refreshingly convincing, and the reactions of the characters remained subtle (under the circs) and believable throughout. A really great portrayal of the early 70's era too, not shying away from typical cultural behaviours/beliefs of the time, perhaps on a par with Life on Mars in that respect. Just fantastic stuff!! (you can probably tell I'm excited to have seen this!).
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I (our crew, Spectral Paranormal) actually rented out the real house portrayed in this film and stayed the night with Luke Tabram from Shadow Paranormal assisting a year before covid lockdown (£70 per person per night). The house is still air B&B style available to rent now. Nothing dramatic happened to us to tell the truth although other groups have collected evidence that the place is still 'buzzing'. Our video was boring so we didn't upload it. This is Luke's video of 30 East Drive, Pontefract, Yorkshire .. the real 'When The Lights Went Out'/The Black Monk of Pontefract house .. I was the cameraman so I'm not seen in this vid, we heard a few bumps and bangs but nothing unusual enough that wasn't just an old cheaply built house cooling down ..

 
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Swifty said:
I (our crew, Spectral Paranormal) actually rented out the real house portrayed in this film and stayed the night with Luke Tabram from Shadow Paranormal assisting a year before covid lockdown (£70 per person per night). The house is still air B&B style available to rent now. Nothing dramatic happened to us to tell the truth although other groups have collected evidence that the place is still 'buzzing'. Our video was boring so we didn't upload it. This is Luke's video of 30 East Drive, Pontefract, Wales .. the real 'When The Lights Went Out'/The Black Monk of Pontefract house .. I was the cameraman so I'm not seen in this vid, we heard a few bumps and bangs but nothing unusual enough that wasn't just an old cheaply built house cooling down ..

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Wales?
 
Swifty said:
We didn't experience anything unusual there. There's a wall downstairs with photos sent in by previous guests that are mostly dark shapes.
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They had little to report too. My daughter said a door appeared to close on its own but couldn't say for sure. Some bloke unconnected to my offspring, was doing a ouija session and said a certain cupboard was a centre of activity and wanted someone to stand in the cupboard and ask questions. My son volunteered and stood in the dark cupboard (he even closed the door). He got nothing......
 
Thinking about it, Pontefract had I believe a reputation as being a centre for weird stuff, or so I remember reading many years ago. It's well remembered in our town for the maternity hospital, because child bearing people were routinely sent there, despite it being 20 or so miles away, with not particularly good public transport links. Indeed my own daughter was born there. I remember reading of a nurse at the maternity hospital crossing the car park late at night. She was nervous, as there was a suspicious man lurking about. Suddenly, a large black dog appeared beside her and walked with her to her car.....I can't remember the book i read it in, but it was in the local library.
 
When The Lights Went Out is currently playing on Amazon Prime.
 
Rushfan62 said:
They had little to report too. My daughter said a door appeared to close on its own but couldn't say for sure. Some bloke unconnected to my offspring, was doing a ouija session and said a certain cupboard was a centre of activity and wanted someone to stand in the cupboard and ask questions. My son volunteered and stood in the dark cupboard (he even closed the door). He got nothing......
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The coal bunker was probably what he was standing in, the room's about the size of a large cupboard (it's smaller than portrayed in the film) and was where Mr. Pritchard reported having his frightening paranormal experience that's also portrayed in the film.

Various investigators have reported the glass panelled doors opening and closing by themselves that are connected to the kitchen although although this was convincingly debunked (IMO) as having a paranormal cause when a couple of more grounded investigators twigged that this was being caused by a vacuum effect depending and what other doors were open or shut in the house.
 
Swifty said:
Various investigators have reported the glass panelled doors opening and closing by themselves that are connected to the kitchen although although this was convincingly debunked (IMO) as having a paranormal cause when a couple of more grounded investigators twigged that this was being caused by a vacuum effect depending and what other doors were open or shut in the house.
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This is precisely what I suspect in the case of my own house (mysteriously opening cupboard door and upstairs bedroom door). In the old saying 'as one door closes, another opens...'
 
Rushfan62 said:
My son and daughter stayed in the house last year. Bit of a rip off apparently.
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Rather like this book on the house:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/product-re...e=all_reviews&pageNumber=1#reviews-filter-bar

I bought it after hearing about the case on the 'Mysterious Universe' podcast. However, it is not an account of the original hauntings but rather a 'Most Haunted' style contemporary account of people staying in the house and getting spooked by so-called ghost hunting equipment, the wind, mice farting in the garden etc...
 
My mistake, our group's video is still up. I wasn't a very eventful night for us which is reflected here. The group organiser's husband did the 'stand in the coal bunker challenge' without anything unusual happening to him .. the coal bunker (the door to it) can be seen at 23:30.

 
Mythopoeika said:
Why is it that these places have a crying girl/boy picture on the wall? Creepy.
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...or this ghastly thing - also allegedly cursed.

blue.png
 
Rushfan62 said:
My sister in law used to have the crying boy picture, they had a house fire too!
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We didn't have a house fire when I was growing up (we did once had a house flood though that I had to deal with and a couple of years later a wood wasps invasion, both times when I was a school boy) .. and my big Sister had two creepy crying boy framed prints on her bedroom wall into the mid 80's, she also had a A-HA poster on the other side of her bedroom because she fancied one of A-HA.

My Grandad used to have this painting in his house so our family seemed to be into images of boys not doing very well .. I had a poster of Linda Lusardi in a revealing silver bikini sitting on a steel bin on my bedroom wall instead.

aboys001.jpg
 
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They were doing well if they could sit there mindlessly chawing through a full melon! I haven't been able to find melon fingers in tesco since last year:(
Now, if I was going to read into this image as an art historian, I would imagine they were imitating the idle rich.
 
merricat said:
They were doing well if they could sit there mindlessly chawing through a full melon! I haven't been able to find melon fingers in tesco since last year:(
Now, if I was going to read into this image as an art historian, I would imagine they were imitating the idle rich.
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I always looked at it and thought the one eating the grapes was thinking "Shit, I think my brother's about to puke on me.".
 
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Swifty said:
The coal bunker was probably what he was standing in, the room's about the size of a large cupboard (it's smaller than portrayed in the film) and was where Mr. Pritchard reported having his frightening paranormal experience that's also portrayed in the film.

Various investigators have reported the glass panelled doors opening and closing by themselves that are connected to the kitchen although although this was convincingly debunked (IMO) as having a paranormal cause when a couple of more grounded investigators twigged that this was being caused by a vacuum effect depending and what other doors were open or shut in the house.
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Yup, when we had new doors installed downstairs I could set them off closing one by one like that. Drove the dogs mad! :chuckle:
 
I just watched this film last night. Good and creepy, quite disturbing. For anyone interested in the poltergeist case it was based on, Colin Wilson did a decent write up in his book Poltergeist!, in which he devoted a whole chapter to the Black Monk of Pontefract. John and Anne Spencer mention the case repearedly in The Poltergeist Phenomenon, but draw heavily on Wilson's book.
 
SimonBurchell said:
I just watched this film last night. Good and creepy, quite disturbing. For anyone interested in the poltergeist case it was based on, Colin Wilson did a decent write up in his book Poltergeist!, in which he devoted a whole chapter to the Black Monk of Pontefract. John and Anne Spencer mention the case repearedly in The Poltergeist Phenomenon, but draw heavily on Wilson's book.
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There's a framed picture of Colin Wilson when we were inside the house. When Most Haunted did an episode in there, Colin's picture was one that was 'thrown around by supernatural forces' in the show. Stuart hilariously says something close to "It's a picture of an old woman!".
 
Swifty said:
There's a framed picture of Colin Wilson when we were inside the house. When Most Haunted did an episode in there, Colin's picture was one that was 'thrown around by supernatural forces' in the show. Stuart hilariously says something close to "It's a picture of an old woman!".
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He often did look like he'd had a nice perm and set :D
 
Swifty said:
My mistake, our group's video is still up. I wasn't a very eventful night for us which is reflected here. The group organiser's husband did the 'stand in the coal bunker challenge' without anything unusual happening to him .. the coal bunker (the door to it) can be seen at 23:30.

Click to expand...

Did anyone produce ectoplasm?
 
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