The 2005 film adaptation of “The Call of Cthulhu” done by the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society is an admirable attempt at creating a period, silent-film retelling of the famous H.P. Lovecraft story.
Although a very well-done endeavor, I find the mix of modern and silent film-making techniques to be distracting. An “either/or” philosophy would have served better. Generally, the silent-film techniques employed serve the film well, but we are taken out of the story by improbable overhead camera shots and other modern techniques. This technique, called “mythoscope” by the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society should probably end here. It isn’t horrible, but it uses too many modern camera angles and other effects to suit my tastes. It’s cool on paper, but the execution leaves me wanting.
From a story-telling perspective, it does not elucidate the written story all that well - there’s a reason filmmaker upon filmmaker have passed upon this film - the three disparate locales in the story make it hard to film a narrative whole. I’m afraid that the HPLHS adaptation doesn’t succeed, either.
That being said, it is a short film. If you’re a H.P. Lovecraft fan, of course you should give this a viewing and decide for yourself.
Wikipedia article
IMDB.com article
Showing posts with label H.P. Lovecraft. Show all posts
Showing posts with label H.P. Lovecraft. Show all posts
Monday, March 21, 2011
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)