The Ghosts Of Oxford Street is a Channel 4 made for television Christmas film/musical, written and directed by legendary music svengali Malcolm Mclaren. The narrative is about the history of Oxford Street, and features Mclaren leaving gifts around the street for legendary figures such as Gordon Selfridge, the American entrepreneur who founded Selfridges and died penniless.

To date, the only time it aired on television was over Christmas in 1991. Up until this week, I had not had the opprotunity to see it again.

Over the years it has gained a strange sort of mystique for me. In part, this was probably due to childhood nostalgia which I associated it with but also because it was nigh on impossible to seek out and watch again.

The film is such an oddity, that the only clip of it on YouTube has been watched a measly 25 times.

I bought the cassette soundtrack at the time of release, and finally managed to update it to the modern CD format a couple of years ago, after procuring a copy on Ebay.

The soundtrack features a number of original Mclaren compositions in the vein of the piano house genre, which was popular at the time.

However, to really appreciate the soundtrack in its full glory it is worthwhile watching the whole film. A particular highlight is Happy Mondays’ take on Staying Alive, which shows them performing by some gallows at Marble Arch.

I finally managed to track down a streaming copy of the film this week on Channel 4’s OD service. Finally, a bit of Christmas magic has been restored.

If you only watch one Christmas film between now and the new year make sure that it is this one.

The Ghosts Of Oxford Street is a lost classic and deserves its place in Christmas television nirvana.

The campaign to spread the word starts here.

Stream it from 4OD’s site here

Theme From The Ghosts Of Oxford Street by Malcolm Mclaren

Magic’s Back by Malcolm Mclaren

Staying Alive by Happy Mondays