A brilliant film that helped define a genre

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

The fact that Will Hay is playing an incompetent school teacher isn't much of a surprise. After all, he played this sort of guy in several films. However, what makes this one unusual is that the comedy becomes a murder mystery!When the film begins, Will Lamb (Hay) is on his way to a boys school in Northern Scotland. This actually makes a lot of sense, as children throughout England were either sent abroad or to the most rural portions of Britain in order to avoid the German blitz. In this case, an entire school has been packed off to an old castle on the Island of Skye...about as remote a location as you can get! However, very soon it's apparent that Lamb is an idiot and can't teach much of anything well but before he can get the sack, the headmaster is dead--either a suicide or murder. The new headmaster knows Lamb and his incompetence and his first act is to fire Lamb. But, very soon after, this new headmaster is also dead...poisoned just like the first one. So, Lamb, one of the professors and some of the students decide to investigate. But they are warned repeatedly about some sort of ghost and some bagpipes...and what do they have to do with any of this?!This is a pretty good film, though compared to some of Hays' other films, comedy is less important to the film and the murder mystery often takes precedence. And, considering it was made during WWII, the Nazi angle didn't come as much of a surprise. Definitely a product of its times but a good one as well...one that stands up pretty well today.By the way, Hay playing an incompetent science teacher is rather funny, as in real life he was, in addition to being an actor, an engineer and astronomer!

In his Hay-Day Will Hay seldom put a foot - or a tonsil – wrong, the Ghost Of St. Michael's was no exception, proving to be yet another classic. Set in a haunted castle on the Isle Of **** (in case Jerry wanted to know the direction to Skye) I've seen this so many times now that I find it sometimes hard to remember they were all really in Ealing's studios even though it was cheaply and simply made. Such is the power of auto-suggestion!Because of the War an English boarding school is evacuated en masse to a castle in Scotland, of which the wild eyed porter John Laurie informs the scoffing new science master Hay and forward pupil Charles Hawtrey that it is haunted with the ghost of a phantom piper. Hay strikes up a friendship with fellow silly master Claude Hulbert, but doesn't impress the weird Head Felix Aylmer and incurs the derision of nasty senior master Raymond Huntley – which doesn't matter as these two don't last very long. So many favourite bits: the lesson in the draughty classroom on What Goes Up Must Come Down – with a disinterested Gerald Campion (the future TV Billy Bunter) sat behind Hawtrey – where Hay is taught a lesson; the dormitory feast where Hay gets tight on some jolly good lemonade to the delight of the boys; displaying his deep knowledge of gases to the boys in the science lesson; the denouement which could so easily have ended flat; but especially the delicious inquest in the barn, of which you must already know I'm going to say all I can say is Fiddlesticks!In the decades before it got out onto DVD it was my most borrowed or copied tape by friends, which is why it's surprising to me that there have been so few commenters here so far. It's always been one of my favourites, a totally un-nasty un-cynical non-violent harmless old fashioned piece of fluff and a, no, the classic of its kind.

Just a couple of points: the school is moved to Skye in the Hebrides, Scotland, NOT the Channel Islands.Also, I would not say it is a take on The Ghost Train: that would be Oh Mr Porter, surely.But certainly one of the most watchable of Will Hay's films.It is amazing to see people like John Laurie, who went on to play Private Frazer in Dad's Army on TV, and, of course, Charles Hawtrey.Did any of the other schoolboys go on to feature or star in other films?Anybody know?If you do, let us know

Will Hay was adored by British audiences who saw his seedy, doddering con man character as preferable to the brash American comics they were offered. However distribution patterns make it seems unlikely that his reputation will outlast those who grew up with it.This is an excellent example of the cycle with the shift to Ealing providing production values - settings that are just a fraction removed from real, superior character actors and Hulbert and Hawtrey a fair swap from his old Moore Marriot and Graham Moffat sidekick team.The film is spun off THE GHOST TRAIN with enough variation to get attention. Aylmer's school is moved to the Channel Islands during WW2 and finds itself in a castle reputedly haunted by a bagpipes blowing, homicidal phantom. Hay, doing his incompetent school teacher character, proves a hit with the boys and blunders into solving the mystery.The film is short on the great gags you might find in a W.C. Fields movie of the kind which must have served as a model for these but the lead trio are endearing and the pacing sharp enough to keep attention. The set pieces, the police inquiry held in the local dairy at milking time and a pursuit through the castle's secret passages, are more than adequate.