I own a great deal of Lovecraft films or attempts at Lovecraft films. Most have been fair to poor. But a few really shine. Dagon (which should be titled The Shadow Over Insmouth) was a good adaptation in my opinion. Take out the romance and nudity and you are alright.

The HPL Society has done well with their Cthulu film and I cannot wait for The Whisperer In Darkness. Anyone know when that will be released.

By Maddog films, a straight textbook interpretation of "The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath" was released in August of 2003 and I found that quite good.

But Beyond The Wall Of Sleep is terrible. The atmosphere is their but the story is not even close to Lovecraft's.

Which films do you think stand out and anyone know of good adaptations from CAS films?

Charles D. O'Connor III

What is the story in the "Beyond" movie then?A dumb guy Geting a car to get ,ehem, with a girl out of his league, staring the Tra-i mean Lovecraft?

Also,im fairly at a loss how Kadath could be adapted-that would cost as much as a Lord of the Rings movie to capture it all-and im not a LOR fabnn at all,Ive just comented on the price.

And to Dagon-they was probably only going for the "UUUUUH,SCARY NAME!" aspect-but it didnt seem to taint the movie,unlike the "CThulhu Mythos" concept has tainted Lovecraft's reputation.One person recently asked for reading recomendations,and added "but away from garbage writers like Lovecraft" and after I asked how he can say that, not only did he went of to call HPL's wording "poor", but he said "Im not too hot for Sci Fi".

Now children,lets pinpoint everything utterly untrue in that statement.

One film which has been mentioned very little, if at all, is "Castle Freak". I'm surprised at that, because it was supposed to have been based on Lovecraft's "The Outsider". By the way, I don't think that it even had a cinema release in my country (England).

These days, I tend to avoid films which claim to be based on Lovecraft's writings. There are not many of them, mind. And overall, I no longer think much of the examples which I have seen. Indeed, I have reached the conclusion that some writings are simply too difficult to adapt for the cinema. At least, to do so effectively.

I find it slightly ironic that anybody actually wanted to make a movie adaptation of "Dagon". That's partly because this is such a short story. Thus, there is relatively little for a movie team to work with in this case. On the otherhand, one of Lovecraft's brilliant novellas, such as, "At The Mountains of Madness", might make a good film. As could his story, "The Horror at Red Hook". What do the rest of you think?


J L H



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 15 Nov 08 | 02:57PM by Raven10.

The Horror at Red Hook is nice, but theres litle hapening there and people would swarm over the political corectness issue,im sure.

Also,I think "Dagon" is just an adapted "Shadow over Insmouth" with a diferent title.

Also,I dunno,I heard the endings diferent. Why do we need a whiny american?

I believe strongly that The Horror At Red Hook would make an excellent movie adaptation if done correctly. Yes the people would swarm over the political correctness. But isn't this freedom of speech? I know CAS would attest strongly to upholding freedom of speech and so would HPL.

Yes, Dagon is an adaptation of Shadow Over Insmouth.

Other films that would make an excellent movie in my opinion are "The Shunned House" (Though its been done once to my knowledge and didn't even stay within the perimeter of the story). The Shadow Out Of Time would be cool, as would the white ship and The Horror In The Darkness.

Any one got any suggestions for titles, proper remakes and things having to do with CAS, Lovecraft, REH and all of them.

HPLHS should handle The Horror at Red Hook; though maybe someone there would get offended to. Point is we need to stop all this relative whining about race, gender etc. etc. that is becoming so big in this 21st Century.

For a long while I've had a fantasy about filming CAS's short tales, and now that I'm beginnnig to learn stop-motion animation, I may eventually take a shot at one. My first pick would (will) be CAS's first weird tale, "The Abominations of Yondo." I think the HPLHS is leading the way in the manner of "period presentation," and I'd follow suit by making a b&w silent film. I see the narrator filmed live in high-contrast, big-gesture footage, and the weird creatures he encounters in Yondo brought to life via stop-motion puppetry.

CAS stories would make an excellent series of short films. I'd choose "The Tale of Satampra Zeiros", "The Seven Geases" or "The Testament of Ammathus" for Hyperborea; "The Double Shadow" or "The Death of Malygris" for Poseidonis; "The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis", "The Dweller in the Gulf" or "Vulthoom" for Mars; "The Empire of the Necromancers", "Xeethra" or "The Master of the Crabs" for Zothique; and of course, "The Maze of Maal Dweb", because :-).

Groovium ~ art, magic, wonder ~ www.groovium.com
"Gerunding adverbly, Noun verbed."

Interesting times. We have Lurker Films and the HPLS attempting to do justice to HPL. CAS would be logical next step for either. "Abomination of Yondo" also would be my first choice.

If you are doing stop-motion you may want to check out the brilliant work of the Quay Brothers.

steve