SOME good effects helped create a build-up of tension in The Ghost Train, the latest showing at Malvern Theatres.

As a group of stranded passengers come to terms with spending a night in a remote Cornish station, they learn from the stationmaster (Henry McGee) the place is haunted.

Before leaving for home, he tells them about the sequence of events leading to a fatal rail crash 20-years earlier and about subsequent ghostly appearances of the train and its passengers.

However, Arnold Ridley's classic play is not strictly a thriller, and after successfully creating strands of suspense and anticipation in the first half, its action and tempo switches as the actors make the most of the funny side of their stilted 1920's lines.

As revelations about what is really going on at the station evolve, the play seems to lurch from Agatha Christie to Bugsy Malone.

Going with the plot is the unbalanced character of Julia Price (Louise Jameson) whose posh accent goes all "cheeseboiga" as she reveals her character's true identity.

Those in the audience who knew the famous play, or the three films that have borrowed from its script, clearly enjoyed the production and found the transition hilarious. However, this reviewer had expected a spine-tingling denouement and felt disappointed by the sudden switch from dramatic to 'hammy'.

On at the Festival Theatre until Saturday, June 29, tickets £10-£18 from 01684 892277.

ALLY HARDY