OT: The Call of Cthulhu movie

[shonokin]

After a year and a half or more in production the new "silent" b&w movie The Call of Cthulhu on DVD (http://www.cthulhulives.org/cocmovie/index.html) . If you are a Lovecraftian (I'm guessing several Hellboyites are, which is why I'm posting this) who laments the fact that there are no decent or at least faithful adaptations of Lovecraft to film, then this is something that should make you very happy.

I've watched this 45 minute movie three times already and am buying several copies to send out to friends who I know need to see this.

[Nick W]

Badass! Thanks for the info! :D

NW

[Johann]

mmm, sounds good. Thanks for the heads up.

[theangryorc]

sweet. thanks for the heads up. must...find...immediately.

[Mikolaj]

BTW... Does anyone know what's up with both Cthulhu games? (there were too: one for the X-box and one for the PC)

[shonokin]

Khan, it's the same game, just for different platforms. Both versions have now been pushed back to Q1 2006. I'm not surprised in the least and doubt it really exists at all. :eek:

Even though Dark Corners of the Earth doesn't really exist, it has a sequel that is due out next year as well.

[Adrammalech]

What exactly is the Lovecraft series, anyway? I mean, sure, I've heard of them, but never ever got the chance to read any of the books, so I dont know what the fuss is all about. Could anyone explain? :(

[theangryorc]

'wierd tale' writer of the early 20th century (died in 1937) and did most of his stuff in the 20s and 30s along with robert e howard, clark ashton smith, etc---stories covered a wide variety of horror aspected tales but he is most know for his cthulu mythos dealing with the elder gods (cthulu being their chief) that exist outside the reality we know. kind of a 'fish bowl' perspective--they are on the outside, man is on the inside, eyeing him with hatred, hunger, etc, etc. also has a great deal on dreams and other realities beyond dreams.

mignola borrowed heavily from this idea with his ogdru jahad concept. lovecraft's gods tend to have lots of tentacles, eyes or various misshappen parts in some combination. lots of ancient, ruined, slime-covered cities too.

lovecraft's stories (as a whole) are all over the place and range from from dunsanay/poe pastich style stories to his own brilliant stories of the wierd. but when he (lovecraft) is good he is very very good and is able to nail the 'creep factor' better than many horror writers out there (he still takes a back seat to poe, self-admittedly even)

anyway, there is a ton of stuff in print and compilations are pretty easy to get your hands on. look for something with call of cthulu, rats in the walls, thing on the doorstep, dunwich horror, colour out of space, herbert west reanimator, shadow out of time, at the mountains of madness---any of those stories in some combination. off the top of my head, those are some good ones. he also wrote a great book on horror and weird fiction called supernatural horror in literature which i can't recommend enough. the first sentence is something like "the oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown." (sad but i have it memorized) that basically is everything lovecraft is about in a nutshell (and horror fiction in general i guess).

del rey has a pretty good series of books that have his stuff broken down into the cthulu mythos, dream cycle, and various early tales. penguin also has started putting out his stuff pretty much broken up the same way.

[shonokin]

And the thing with Lovecraft's writing is it's unadaptability to film, at least so far and at least with Hollywood types who think a love story or lots of gore and sex should be shoved into the plots (all of which there is almost none present in Lovecraft's works, outside of gore in The Re-Animator).

So people that are into lovecraft tend to dread whatever movie adaptation happens to come out. Even the really good and broadly appreciated ones such as Dan O'Bannon's The Resurrected (based on "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward") are not very faithful to the original stories.

And though there are some very good indie adaptations, some of which are almost word for word recounts of the original stories, The Call of Cthulhu is really something special. Like Lovecraft's stories, once you can get "into it" it will take you places dark and eldritch.

For more on Lovecraft
http://www.hplovecraft.com

for more on Lovecraft movies
http://thelurker.com/
http://lurkerfilms.com/
http://www.unfilmable.com/news.html

the funny thing is, Lovecraft was really appalled by the idea of any of his tales being adapted to movies.
"It is not likely that any really finely wrought weird story - where so much depends upon mood, and on nuances of description - could be changed to a drama without irreparable cheapening and the loss of all that gave it power."- H. P. Lovecraft

[Adrammalech]

Awesome, thanks for the tons of help guys! :D