Film-making duo Jones & Jolliffe deliver bleak and spooky visions in modern day Blighty with this inspired tale of the supernatural.A winning cast plays out the story of a 12 year-old girl haunted by survivor's guilt after living through a horrific car accident that claimed her best friend. The guilty conscience coincides with subtle but decidedly ethereal events in the family's rundown, government subsidized building. Is a ghost haunting the family or is there a corporeal explanation for furniture going bump in the night? The film looks startling realistic which heightens the goose flesh when the boo shocks come (especially in the first 25 minutes) but the film doesn't settle for scares, it also examines the real world struggles of a single mother and her brood facing down to earth skepticism of money lenders, social workers and the police. Some viewers may be put off when the film neglects ghostly activity in favor of character study, and perhaps some of the tone shifts are unwieldy, nonetheless this is one of the best (and painfully overlooked by US distributors) British genre films since DOG SOLDIERS. Bravo.

I first heard about this movie in an article I read in the publication Cemetery Dance and had been looking for it ever since. I have to say, it really wasn't what I was expecting when I rented it. In my opinion, this movie centers more upon an adolescent girl's ability to deal with guilt/grief from a horrible auto accident than upon any poltergeist/demon or ghost (if there ever even was one...) The acting was descent, and the arrangement of the film was such that it kept you interested and waiting for something to happen, but as far as delivery, I felt a little let down. While I am the first to agree that the less you see of a monster, the scarier it is, In this case there just really didn't seem to be much haunting going on. Some wraps at the door, a dresser being moved (maybe) and some noisy pipes are about all we got. I thought there was a lot of potential for this film to be better by tying it in with the girl's trauma, but no conclusion was ever really made. Was it real? Was it not? For those of you who have seen Emily Rose, you know what I'm talking about. Perhaps I was just in the mood for a film where there was more of a paranormal climax than a psychological one. Not that it was a bad film, but with a title like Urban Ghost Story, I had expected a little more spook for my buck.

Being an American, I was familiar with American independents, but hadn't experienced low budget features from abroad. I didn't know what to expect. "Urban Ghost Story" was a pleasant surprise. We have nothing on the Brits. While this film occasionally shows it's low budget, that becomes part of the film's charm. The filmmakers are saying that they didn't spend a lot, but they can still bring the audience a lot. The film feels very stark, eerie, and enclosed. It kept me on the edge of my seat wondering what comes next. Sometimes frightening me about what comes next. And then it gave me a finale that I was certain probably cost more than the budget of the entire movie. I have no idea how they did that.

Finding any work with Billy Boyd here in the US is tough so finding something where Billy is credited as 'loan shark' told me he wouldn't be in it much - and he was only in two scenes. However, the story itself was absorbing, though slow or repetitive in a couple of places. There was a good amount of tension building to keep me interested. While I am not familiar with who's who in the Scottish acting world, I thought there were strong performances by Heather Ann Foster, Stephanie Buttle and Nicola Stapleton, as well as a fair turn for Jason Connery. I was quite astonished by Billy's foul mouthed character - a loan shark that has a stutter that comes out when he particularly angry. I thought he played the part well. He certainly startled me with his performance - so much anger. Generally, I don't go in for these kind of movies and it was curiosity of Billy's previous work that got my attention. But it was the story that kept me watching.