I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

Blistering performances.

A brilliant scientist is summoned to an old house by her bossy husband to lead experiments that will out-Japanese the Japenese boffins. But the team gets side-tracked in pursuit of the resident ghost, and tragedy ensues.This is as bad as it gets. Over-written, wooden acting, soap opera instead of drama, bad effects, and no point, no theme. At several points there are so many actors nodding agreement, or falsely laughing, you have to think the equity union insisted on maximum representation in each scene - despite the nasty pre-Thatcherite slagging off of unions. Almost everything is redundant. So it's another British haunted house horror - all they can do in horror - but surely nothing worse than this .... Oh dear, forty years later they gave us The Lady In Black. Head, desk - thwack thwack thwack.Overall - very poor story and production, and a black mark against everyone involved.

My years at IMDb have not been in vain and if I have been taught one thing by fellow user Theo Robertson, then it is that I should give Nigel Kneale a bit of my time when the chance arises. So it was that I found myself watching this film, one I knew absolutely nothing about apart from that it was some form of ghost story and that it had been written by Kneale. The plot sees an electronics firm moving into an old Victorian building to start a project looking at a new recording method that is beyond tape (utter sci-fi of course). When one of the team spots a ghost, project leader Peter Brock decides to investigate and more.From the very start of the film one of the main barriers to it is evident – it has not aged well. It is true to say that good stories do not age, however this is not the same as presentation, performances, wardrobe, effects, dialect and so on – mostly these things do date and not well. Sometimes the dating effect means it can be unintentionally comic to those watching years later, having seen these things many times and be spoofed as well; so for example the visual effects to convey panic and fear in Jill in the opening scene in the car park is a little bit like this and it is a problem that it never wholly will get away from for many viewers. That said, the material mostly doesn't date and the ideas are well presented, interesting and a little bit spooky – they didn't chill me as much as I had wanted but again this was down to most of the scenes on this side of the film using dated special effects where I would have preferred more to have been done with atmosphere and tone (as was the case in the more effective parts of the film).The cast are a little bit BBC-workshopy. Bryant tends to project and I wasn't helped by how much he reminded me of John Sessions in terms of performance and looks. Asher is better which is good as she has more convincing to do – visual and camera effects aside, she is really good here. The supporting cast are mostly so-so, with some odd performances and characters. One thing common amongst all the characters was the very dated language – a lot of it surprisingly racist in regards put-on accents and sentiments; I understand that it is "of its time" but again this is one aspect of the "dating" that was a barrier to me watching it over 40 years later.Despite the problems with it, the ideas and atmosphere just about make it all stay together and work. It isn't as good as it should have been and it is impossible to say that the dating of the film has had no impact on its effectiveness, but it is still decent enough to be worth a look.

I've been looking forward to seeing The Stone Tape ever since I happened across it in an IMDb list that enthusiastically promoted the telemovie as a high point in British Television horror. I had only good expectations when I realised Nigel Kneale wrote it... I very much liked the various Quatermass miniseries/films.I don't dispute that this is a very good British television horror/sci- fi production. It's really quite good, but it hasn't aged very well. There are lots of little things that work against The Stone Tape and the atmosphere the movie is pushing. The sets are at times too obviously constructed on a sound-stage, and evoke Doctor Who rather than victorian haunted house. There is also an unsettling theme of misogyny and sexism that runs through the narrative but is never seriously dealt with or reprimanded - it's something that also makes the whole setup incredible, since it's hard to believe that this group of men who carry on like they're on a boy's school outing are seriously professional audio and electrical engineers who are trying to challenge "the Japs'" and their technology companies. Overall it's hard to find anybody to like or care about in the story. Jill is somewhat like-able, but she is all too incredibly frustrating the way she is written as a woman who seems to be overly dependent on men...Unfortunately for those looking for a scare, the mix of science fiction and ghost mystery works to the detriment of anything really scary... The way the sci-fi is worked into the ghost story is interesting, but at the cost of it completely eliminating the possibility of truly scaring the audience.If you're not still stuck in the 70s this will be underwhelming... but it is still appreciable as a product of its time.

BBC four showed a tribute to the great Nigel Kneale entitled THE KNEALE TAPES and followed it with a screening of the 1972 teleplay THE STONE TAPE . I enjoyed the profile but couldn`t help thinking I would have preferred seeing the groundbreaking 1984 or even QUATERMASS 2 but never look a gift horse in the mouth I enjoyed THE STONE TAPE far more than I expected but there is a slight flaw to it - It`s highly derivative of Kneale`s other scripts from the past , especially his masterwork QUATERMASS AND THE PIT . Without giving too much away I was instantly reminded of the events of Hobs Lane with a terrified character running away and a minister turning up with a bell , book and candle THE STONE TAPE does thankfully manage to stand on its own legs and works as a haunted house story . It`s also very clever even if it`s not amongst Kneale`s greatest work though some viewers may be put off with the unsympathetic characters especially Peter Brock , but remember Kneale`s not the sort of guy who paints people black and white . Director Peter Sasdy`s direction may be a little flat but that`s not really a criticism and he does bring a certain amount of atmosphere to the play , check out the scary title and end credits . My only criticism of Sasdy is that the acting is a little over emphatic , which strangely seems to be a problem with some of Nigel Kneale teleplays no matter who the director is . But it`s still pretty good stuff from a time when watching television was a great experience ,and I`d be very interested in what people who have never seen QUATERMASS AND THE PIT thought of it .And if you`re reading this Mister Kneale I`d like to say thanks for all the outstanding drama you`ve given us over the decades