Underplayed Gems

Lot No. 249 (2023)

Lot No. 249 poster
Original title
A Ghost Story for Christmas: Lot No. 249
Country
United Kingdom
Runtime
29 min
Rating
5.9 of 10 from 14 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalogue in 3D

The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

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How it feels

In 1890s Oxford, a student athlete discovers his neighbor is using a revived Egyptian mummy to kill his rivals. The film is a gothic horror story based on an Arthur Conan Doyle tale.

spookyatmosphericslow-burngothiccreepysuspensefulclassicold-fashioned

What happens

Lot No. 249 is a short film which is part of the British supernatural anthology series A Ghost Story for Christmas. Produced by Isibeal Ballance and written and directed by Mark Gatiss, it is based on the gothic horror story of the same name by Arthur Conan Doyle, first published in Harper's Magazine in 1892, and first aired on BBC Two on 24 December 2023. It stars Kit Harington as Abercrombie Smith, a student athlete at Oxford University who discovers that his neighbour, Edward Bellingham (Freddie Fox) is using a revived Egyptian mummy to murder his rivals. The majority of instalments in the series have been based on ghost stories by M. R. James, with "The Signalman" (1976), based on a story by Charles Dickens, and three original episodes being the only break with this tradition. Gatiss had expressed a desire to adapt other authors, and a season of programming related to Conan Doyle which the BBC aired over Christmas 2023 influenced the choice of "Lot No. 249". (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

This page is from Underplayed Gems. Not quite it? You can browse by genre, country and year, or take this one into the 3D catalogue and ask the Catbot for something closer.