The Mistletoe Bough (1904)

I learned about this while looking at the fifth volume of The Valancourt Book of Victorian Ghost Stories, which includes the lyrics to a popular British song written by Thomas Haynes Bayly dating back to 1829 about a young woman who seemingly vanishes during a game of hide-and-seek and whose skeleton is found in a chest years later. The underlying story is even older - Wikipedia credits Samuel Rogers with the earliest written version, a poem titled, "Ginevra", published seven years earlier, with the caveat the narrative was most likely folklore before either Bayly or Rogers wrote it down. Apparently, there are numerous old manors throughout England claiming to have been the site of the supposed tragedy inspiring the story.

One difference that's hard to miss between Bayly's "The Mistletoe Bough" and Roger's "Ginevra" is that the earlier poem wasn't set at Christmas. Bayly's song, as the name implies, absolutely is - at least until the time jump at the end. I find this interesting, as a different setting would actually work better thematically. The woman who dies hiding in a chest is a young bride, so it would make more sense to have the catalyst for the game as a wedding party (as was the case in Rogers's version), rather than a Christmas party. Likewise, starting in spring would seem like a more natural thematic beat to hit.

So why did Bayly shift his version to Christmas? I suppose that question assumes he wasn't working off of an existing version of the story he'd heard set during the holidays, but - even if that's the case - the same question remains shifting the choice from Bayly to the unknown earlier author or storyteller. The answer, of course, is that Christmas was a natural time for this sort of macabre story in the 1800s, particularly in Britain. But you already knew that - I found this in a compilation of Victorian Christmas ghost stories, after all.

Though that's worth exploring, as well. Christmas ghost stories weren't defined as necessarily being set at Christmas, but rather by the expectation of being told during the holidays. Think of the way horror movies are often automatically associated with Halloween, rather than the way we now think about Christmas movies. However, we're talking about a song, not prose, so perhaps the shift in setting was necessary to transform a (Christmas) horror story into a Christmas song.

Regardless, it demonstrates how closely the season was associated with darker tales in the 1800s, and the eventual adaptation into film demonstrates the lasting endurance of that association.

Oh, right, I'm supposed to be reviewing a movie, aren't I?

Well, consider everything above a down payment on context. The holiday elements in the film are actually somewhat muted, though the fact it's explicitly adapting a Christmas song should remove doubt as to when it's supposed to be set. Other than the title, though, there is a bough of the titular greenery hanging in a dance hall, a bit of snow visible in some external shots, and some barren trees in the background. With the added context of the title, you can infer this is meant to be set at Christmas, but if I'd been watching this without knowing the background and source, I'd probably have questioned its holiday credentials.

The film is fairly straightforward. It's around eight minutes long, and aside for one "30 Years After" card, there are no interstitials or dialogue. Everything is conveyed through action, though my guess is the movie was made with the assumption those watching would already be familiar with the story (not that it's hard to understand). Judging by the costumes, I'm guessing this was meant to be set in the 1700s, which makes a degree of sense - the story is meant to have occurred a long time ago, after all. Perhaps that's why there aren't more familiar holiday decorations, such as a Christmas tree.

We see the characters play out a typical dance, then the doomed woman runs off to hide. The film tries to up the tension by having her excitedly looking around for the best option in the room she finds before settling on a chest that's been in the center of the shot the whole time (again, the point is the audience knows the story). Everyone looks around for her, becoming progressively more frustrated and concerned. There's an extended bit with a handkerchief found in front of the chest that no one seems capable of connecting to the closed box. Well, one guys does, but when he realizes it's locked, he dismisses the idea.

Cue that 30 year time jump. The specific amount of time is a new addition, for what it's worth - the song doesn't tell us. A more significant addition follows, with a character seeing the woman's ghost in a vision revealing her location. This is done with the usual double-exposure tricks heavily utilized in the early days of cinema (which, for what it's worth, have always impressed me - they only had so many tools to play with, but they got pretty good with them). At any rate, the chest is opened, revealing.... Actually, we don't see what's inside, but the characters who do are horrified. Consider it an early example of trusting the audience's imagination to do the heavy lifting in this genre.

I find this film interesting mostly due to how surprisingly unambiguous its genre feels. While some of the exaggerated movements and costuming (one of the men who appears at the end is aged up by 30 years), the tone is fairly dark. This is, after all, a fairly disturbing ghost story. It feels closer to early adaptations of The Little Match Girl than contemporary films I've seen that are typically identified as early horror, most of which are following in Georges Méliès's footsteps by playing up the spectacle and comedy of their subject matter.

I want to be careful not to oversell this, though. The tone is present, but this certainly doesn't resemble the expressionist horror of later decades. The cinematography and design are very simple, focusing on clarity over style, and I doubt most modern viewers would appreciate this as anything beyond its historical context. But, in my opinion at least, that context is kind of fascinating. This is, after all, a bridge between the Christmas ghost stories of the Victorian era and later British (and American) Christmas horror films.

It's also worth noting this was hardly the last adaptation of The Mistletoe Bough. There are several additional silent versions, though I haven't had a chance yet to dig into how many are still around and are accessible. Likewise, if you're interested in the source material, there are versions of the Christmas song easily accessible on Youtube, and Rogers's Ginevra is pretty easy to find online.