The Call of Cthulhu
H.P. Lovecraft Holiday Review Special
By Kenny Farino
H.P. Lovecraft Holiday Special
Howard Philip Lovecraft was an American writer who was born on August 20th, 1890, starting his career as an author of 'weird fiction' for pulp fiction magazines. Weird fiction was used to describe tales that, now, would be classed in the genres of fantasy, horror, and science-fiction. His main emphasis was on cosmic horror, depicting entities and situations that are beyond the minuscule scale of comprehension that humans share. As a result, the protagonists of his tales are usually driven insane.
He looks like a horror writer, doesn't he?
One of H.P. Lovecraft's most famous creations was the Cthulhu Mythos, an entire fictional universe that was later expanded on by many other authors in the years to come, many of whom were inspired by his work. This includes August Derleth, Robert Bloch (of "Psycho" fame), and Lin Carter. One of the most famous tales to come out of this mythos was "The Call of Cthulhu", which was written in the summer of 1926, and was published in Weird Tales, February 1928.
Cthulhu
This is about the tale of Francis Wayland Thurston, who discovers many forbidden manuscripts documenting, amongst other things, the discovery of a strange cult that worships a god known as "Cthulhu;" one of the tales found in this document even describes an encounter with this deity, newly awakened, in the supposedly lost city of R'lyeh. This third tale was told by the sole survivor of a wreck, Gustaf Johansen, whose crew was attacked on the Emma by the Alert, an armed ship that attacked with no warning. After learning everything there was to learn from the manuscripts, Thurston knew that he was doomed because he knew too much. This is a fairly hard story to explain because it has no linear structure, so all I can really tell you to do is read the story for yourself.
In 2005, the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society decided to undertake the tasks of adapting one of the most unadaptable stories into a film, emulating the movie-style of the time that The Call of Cthulhu was written. This means that the HPLHS emulated the style of the silent film, using a technology called "Mythoscope" to create something that feels that it came straight out of the 1920's! This comes complete with custom title cards and its own symphonic score. They were hoping to create "the most authentic and faithful screen adaptation of a Lovecraft story yet attempted" (the back of the DVD). Did they succeed?
The Good
Good god, they actually succeeded! What?! How?! How did they take a compilation of stories and documents, and successfully mesh them together to make a linear story that still makes sense?! They pulled it off. The movie has segments with Thurston reading through the documents, and the stories are told in such a way that it is like a set of vignettes tied together, much like Tales From The Crypt or Creepshow. It is a very entertaining movie for a Lovecraft fan, and I'm happy to say that this is actually extremely accurate while allowing flexibility in its structure. In the behind the scenes, shooting in the silent film style forced the creators to think creatively, and also allow them to do things that modern films cannot when adapting a Lovecraft story.
The style is also beautifully done, emulating the 1920's feel with mostly success! The beginning starts off as a silent film would, the custom title cards and eerie musical score kicking everything off! The quality of the film is grainy, it has no color, and the lighting is beautifully executed to give a gothic, German Expressionistic feel to the movie. Speaking of which, the lost city of R'lyeh is asymmetrical, nonsensical, and defies any natural law. To achieve this effect, the creators made scenery that was very reminiscent of the classic tale The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, a German film made in 1919. The props were also very accurate to the period, and it was an added bonus.
The actors were also tailored to look as they would have in a real silent film, make-up used to accentuate certain details that would compliment the lighting. 1920's actors had a very distinct look from the people of Hollywood, and the HPLHS were very careful to look at this detail. They also act not with their voices - since this IS a silent film - but instead act with their bodies and faces, deriving from the pantomime school of acting that was used. See, silent film actors were very much like stage actors before the advent of sound, vaudeville and plays translating neatly to silent movies since the two are more closely related than talkies and stage shows. Old Castro, for instance, reminded me of Renfield from the Universal Dracula movie in his style and overall crazy appearance and mannerisms. He was spot-on!
Old Castro
As a fan of silent films, owning several of them on DVD like The Man Who Laughs, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and several Lon Chaney Sr. movies, I can really appreciate how well they have mimicked the style of a bygone age.
By the way, HOW COOL IS THE CLAYMATION OF CTHULHU?! OH MY GOD THIS IS REALLY NEAT HOW THEY DID THIS! FANBOYGASM. Anyway, in the final portion of the third story, the feared squid god finally makes an appearance when he awakens in R'lyeh, the filmmakers using a really neat effect of green-screening the claymation monster on the backdrop to make him appear several stories high, out-sizing the human actors on screen. I found this out in the Extras portion of the DVD, and I'm actually inspired to try it with a later endeavor.
The Bad
Unfortunately, some aspects didn't work as well as expected. For instance, you could tell when a green screen was used in some scenes. I'm not talking about when it HAD to be used, like the sunken city of R'lyeh, but in scenes where they could have very easily just shot it on a built set, or on location. For instance, the swamp scene in the "Tale of Inspector Legrasse" segment was when the police were called to investigate a ritual involving the Cthulhu Cult. You could tell the cultists were green screened onto the swampy background, and I thought that was just really fucking lazy on their part. It was obvious that you guys had some sort of budget, why couldn't you just get the people out onto the swamp and have them be in there without the green screen? Or why not build the set in a studio like in the days of the silent film, and go from there? You could very easily manipulate the different elements of cinema like light and atmosphere, so why not do that?!
Actually, they could have done the same with some segments including the city of R'lyeh, because it looks like a cheap effect when they green screen people on there. However, I can excuse this latter part because the dream sequences with the city are green-screened, while most of the final scene featuring R'lyeh mostly have the actors on the set. Also, this was incredibly low budget ($50,000), so I'm just being a stickler here. There were also some segments that were slightly over-exposed, under-exposed, and what have you, but we can't be perfect when this isn't even a studio-produced film, right? Also, I'm not sure what was up with the water in the final segment of the film, but I'm sure in the days of silent films they were able to put people on real water. In this movie, they used a fabric material instead. What the fuck? Weren't they able to use water in Nosferatu and Dracula? Again, this was probably mainly due to the budget.
Nosferatu
The Verdict
Despite the winging and the bitching, this was really well done for what it was: an extremely faithful adaptation of a Lovecraft story on a really low budget. Seriously, if you are interested in the exploits of Lovecraft or Cthulhu, please give this movie a shot. It's really awesome!
4.5/5
"The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate its contents"
Keep your eyes open for Part 2 of Lovecraft's Holiday Special, coming soon with a freshly severed talking head!
Comments
acidflutterby
11 Dec 2009, 11:12
Your review was insightful but a little too light on the plot of the movie.
What is The Call of Cthulu about?
Belphegor-Fan
16 Dec 2009, 09:01
Yes the film looks great but I was hoping for a more informative review
with more story plot and maybe some history of the crew who made the
movie.
Just a suggestion for the future.
Kenny Farino
18 Dec 2009, 15:18
acidflutterby & Belphegor-Fan: It's VERY hard to explain the basic story of
Call of Cthulhu because the original story's structure was not linear, and
was told in an entirely subjective mode ala flashbacks or news clips.
Essentially, this man finds his dead relative's notes on a strange Cthulhu
cult, the deity in question being a malevolent being that will bring the
destruction of everything. When the main character learns too much from the
little stories and clips he reads about said cult, the story ends with him
dreading the inevitable future where he will die.
Sean
09 May 2010, 19:22
We're glad you enjoyed our film. Some of your comments were fascinating to
those of us who made the film, as your conclusions for how and why a number
of scenes were shot the way there were are a fair ways off the mark.
Kenny Farino
11 May 2010, 18:17
Holy crap, I'm honored to have one of the people responsible actually see
this review! I appreciate the comment!
**Occult-Audio**
07 Jun 2010, 01:42
Hi. I found your review in a Google search and it was a most interesting
read. I like this fan movie too but I would consider re writing it some
because you skip over the key player of this movie. The music. The musical
score says every thing that the actors do not and it makes the movie
unsettling. I discovered it when I let the movie play in another room and I
could hear the music and I was getting in my own kitchen. XD
Kenny Farino
07 Jun 2010, 15:35
...... D'OH.
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