DaMU's 15 Best Lovecraft Movie Moments

[Dead & Messed Up]

A new entry every two days, in honor of the Halloween month. Re-posted from my blog. I decided to forgo explanations or synopses and instead pair up the film moments with Lovecraft text. Hopefully it all makes sense.

Note: the indexed links take you outside this forum to HorrorFilms101.

01. Alien - "The Call of Cthulhu" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-1.html)
02. In the Mouth of Madness - "The Music of Erich Zann" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-2-in.html)
03. King Kong, The Call of Cthulhu - "The Horror at Red Hook" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-3-king.html)
04. Cthulhu - The Shadow Over Innsmouth" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-4.html)
05. The Mist - "Dagon" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-5-mist.html)
06. The Thing - "At the Mountains of Madness" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-6.html)
07. The Little Mermaid - "The Call of Cthulhu" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-7.html)
08. Dagon - "The Temple" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-8.html)
09. The Descent - "The Lurking Fear" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-9.html)
10. Hellboy - "The Other Gods" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment.html)
11. Ghostbusters - "The Dunwich Horror" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-11.html)
12. From Beyond - "From Beyond" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-12.html)
13. Vampyr - "The Silver Key" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-13.html)
14. Evil Dead II - "History of the Necronomicon" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-14.html)
15. The X-Files: Fight the Future - "At the Mountains of Madness" (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-15-x.html)


15. Exploring the Spacecraft
The X-Files: Fight the Future, Rob Bowman 1996

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-N69yJf7O0AA/ToimW95u94I/AAAAAAAAAX4/lAT7zUgWEKU/s1600/Lovecraft-XFiles1.jpg

It would be cumbrous to give a detailed, consecutive account of our wanderings inside that cavernous, aeon-dead honeycomb of primal masonry; that monstrous lair of elder secrets which now echoed for the first time, after uncounted epochs, to the tread of human feet.


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-iequdRkR9y8/ToimYa3DtpI/AAAAAAAAAYA/kT9uC1ifdMU/s1600/Lovecraft-XFiles3.jpg

This is especially true because so much of the horrible drama and revelation came from a mere study of the omnipresent mural carvings...


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zhGSWilOaTM/ToimYzs7kyI/AAAAAAAAAYE/k5Lk01jwx5w/s1600/Lovecraft-XFiles4.jpg

The building which we had entered was one of great size and elaborateness, and gave us an impressive notion of the architecture of that nameless geologic past. The inner partitions were less massive than the outer walls, but on the lower levels were excellently preserved. Labyrinthine complexity, involving curiously irregular differences in floor levels, characterised the entire arrangement...We decided to explore the more decrepit upper parts first of all, hence climbed aloft in the maze for a distance of some 100 feet, to where the topmost tier of chambers yawned snowily and ruinously open to the polar sky...


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6Oep2ah_Whc/ToimZovkQ5I/AAAAAAAAAYI/fIvGvrWuCqA/s1600/Lovecraft-XFiles5.jpg

After thoroughly examining the upper regions and the glacial level we descended story by story into the submerged part, where indeed we soon saw we were in a continuous maze of connected chambers and passages probably leading over unlimited areas outside this particular building. The Cyclopean massiveness and giganticism of everything about us became curiously oppressive; and there was something vaguely but deeply unhuman in all the contours, dimensions, proportions, decorations, and constructional nuances...


"At the Mountains of Madness"
Chapter VI

[Spinal]

Absurdly cool idea.

[Ezee E]

Indeed. I don't really know anything Lovecraft, but I sure seem to read about him a lot on Match Cut. I look forward to this.

[Winston*]

Man, when it's in excerpts like that Lovecraft's prose reads so cool. But then when I've read some of his stories I realise how much that incomprehensible terror is informed by racial anxieties and it makes me uncomfortable.

Interested in this thread.

[megladon8]

Wow, insanely cool thread idea.

[MadMan]

Sweet.

[Dead & Messed Up]

14. The Necronomicon
Evil Dead II, Sam Raimi 1987

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-J7RA5Mo3g6Y/TojBREzLdVI/AAAAAAAAAYM/cUIG8LIp8XM/s1600/Lovecraft-ED1.jpg

Original title Al Azif — azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos'd to be the howling of daemons. Composed by Abdul Alhazred, a mad poet of Sanaá, in Yemen, who is said to have flourished during the period of the Ommiade caliphs, circa 700 A.D.


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SzV8TLPQh-o/TojBR64-NaI/AAAAAAAAAYQ/5zUQjciMDEw/s1600/Lovecraft-ED2.jpg

He visited the ruins of Babylon and the subterranean secrets of Memphis and spent ten years alone in the great southern desert of Arabia...which is held to be inhabited by protective evil spirits and monsters of death. Of this desert many strange and unbelievable marvels are told by those who pretend to have penetrated it.


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w9RldHcPE7E/TojBSejMwOI/AAAAAAAAAYU/5ijFZOQ4uvc/s1600/Lovecraft-ED3.jpg

In his last years Alhazred dwelt in Damascus, where the Necronomicon (Al Azif) was written, and of his final death or disappearance (738 A.D.) many terrible and conflicting things are told.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jE1RY1nRTBY/TojBTObGqUI/AAAAAAAAAYY/Aov2JfGmHOM/s1600/Lovecraft-ED4.jpg

He is said by Ebn Khallikan (12th cent. biographer) to have been seized by an invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number of fright-frozen witnesses.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cuzjh7Gfykk/TojBTq6_8dI/AAAAAAAAAYc/ml2Ty94QEdw/s1600/Lovecraft-ED5.jpg

Of his madness many things are told.


"History of the Necronomicon"

[Glass Co.]

This is great. Looking forward to hopefully seeing some entries for Alien, The Thing, and at least one Cronenberg. :)

[MadMan]

He is said by Ebn Khallikan (12th cent. biographer) to have been seized by an invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number of fright-frozen witnesses. Wonderful :lol:

[Dead & Messed Up]

13. Dream Quest (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-13.html)
Vampyr, Carl Dreyer 1932

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eL8lo-BUUyg/To32ChSqMAI/AAAAAAAAAY4/g_4Yjx35FJg/s1600/Lovecraft-Vampyr1.jpg

His dreams were meanwhile increasing in vividness, and thought shewing him none of the strange cities and incredible gardens of the old days, were assuming a definite cast whose purpose could not be mistaken. They were calling him back along the years, and with the mingled wills of all his fathers were pulling him toward some hidden and ancestral source.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KWcW-I-kjSs/To32nJPrxDI/AAAAAAAAAZA/pAyGdNSObsM/s1600/Lovecraft-Vampyr2.jpg

Then he knew he must go into the past and merge himself with old things, and day after day he thought of the hills to the north where haunted Arkham and the rushing Miskatonic and the lonely rustic homestead of his people lay.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HeDQhuPYEUU/To32np0JspI/AAAAAAAAAZE/-ckmpByOEfE/s1600/Lovecraft-Vampyr3.jpg

In the brooding fire of autumn Carter took the old remembered way past graceful lines of rolling hill and stone-walled meadow, distant vale and hanging woodland, curving road and nestling farmstead, and the crystal windings of the Miskatonic, crossed here and there by rustic bridges of wood or stone...


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QguJRmQ7U-4/To32oSTl7iI/AAAAAAAAAZI/ixnq6X-n-qs/s1600/Lovecraft-Vampyr4.jpg

Then there was the crumbling farmhouse of old Goody Fowler the witch, with its little evil windows and great roof sloping nearly to the ground on the north side.


"The Silver Key"


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-77QiZlxyP00/To31EPdBoCI/AAAAAAAAAY0/xpau1eCo2Ag/s1600/Lovecraft-Vampyr5.jpg

Doppelgangers

[MadMan]

Creepy all around. Vampyr is one of the more bizarre movies I've ever seen.

[megladon8]

OoOoOo...my favorite entry yet!

Great text selection, DaMU!

[Dead & Messed Up]

OoOoOo...my favorite entry yet!

Great text selection, DaMU!

Thanks! That sequence makes me think of his dream-cycle in general, but I was surprised by how closely the passage fits.

[Dead & Messed Up]

12. Other Dimensions (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-12.html)
From Beyond, Stuart Gordon 1986

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PuQ9JHNMMbA/ToyjZKWiykI/AAAAAAAAAYg/HyHDMc9uRz0/s1600/Lovecraft-From1.jpg

I saw the attic laboratory, the electrical machine...


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PGidQb7mX8Y/Toyjaj2ycdI/AAAAAAAAAYk/FKzeN2-pfy0/s1600/Lovecraft-From2.jpg

...and the unsightly form of Tillinghast opposite me; but of all the space unoccupied by familiar material objects not one particle was vacant.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Roj1Pe3E-Z8/ToyjbfkxENI/AAAAAAAAAYo/M0qasfWyfTI/s1600/Lovecraft-From3.jpg

Indescribable shapes both alive and otherwise were mixed in disgusting disarray, and close to every known thing were whole worlds of alien, unknown entities...foremost among the living objects were great inky, jellyfish monstrosities which flabbily quivered in harmony with the vibrations from the machine.


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-0m0OvR88cvU/ToyjcFc49bI/AAAAAAAAAYs/xBo21bUzcdo/s1600/Lovecraft-From4.jpg

They were present in laothsome profusion, and I saw to my horror that they overlapped; that they were semi-fluid and capable of passing through one another and through what we know as solids.


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-SnnbvPs_prI/ToyjcsX39wI/AAAAAAAAAYw/RHByIyOAulA/s1600/Lovecraft-From5.jpg

These things were never still, but seemed ever floating about with some malignant purpose.


"From Beyond"

[Spinal]

Jellyfish monstrosities are among the worst kind of monstrosites known to man.

[megladon8]

I know it's an unpopular opinion, but From Beyond has always been my favorite film from Gordon. I find it much better than his more widely recognized Re-Animator.

Another great entry, DaMU!

[MadMan]

I think that Re-Animator is better, but From Beyond is great. Both crack my Top 50 Horror Movies list.

[Dead & Messed Up]

11. Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?
Ghostbusters, Ivan Reitman 1984

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-b1ErUsb0Awk/TpHyoX-3DhI/AAAAAAAAAZ8/jaEOdergyUU/s1600/Lovecraft-Ghost6.jpg

Armitage saw that the time for positive action had come, and spoke decisively to the faltering group of frightened rustics.


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2OBG8eoRjLI/TpHwIlWe4LI/AAAAAAAAAZo/WCmfNK1DyXA/s1600/Lovecraft-Ghost1.jpg

"We must follow it, boys." He made his voice as reassuring as possible. "I believe there's a chance of putting it out of business."


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Saj_iLi4Xp4/TpHwKH7WmFI/AAAAAAAAAZw/ZJVRYRLFWGs/s1600/Lovecraft-Ghost3.jpg

"You men know that those Whateleys were wizards--well, this thing is a thing of wizardry, and must be put down by the same means."


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qxbKyXyztX4/TpHwLL-ZNyI/AAAAAAAAAZ0/o0tkRvUgvIY/s1600/Lovecraft-Ghost4.jpg

"I've seen Wilbur Whateley's diary and read some of the strange old books he used to read; and I think I know the right kind of spell to recite to make the thing fade away."


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EdoybaEWEOE/TpHwLggrKiI/AAAAAAAAAZ4/1u1X8w5iaKc/s1600/Lovecraft-Ghost5.jpg

"Of course, one can't be sure, but we can always take a chance..."


"The Dunwich Horror"

[MadMan]

Well I never thought of Ghostbusters that way. Cool.

[Dead & Messed Up]

Well I never thought of Ghostbusters that way. Cool.

More reading on that subject. (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/08/feature-h-p-lovecraft-presents.html)

Ghostbusters is very Lovecrafty.

[MadMan]

Nice, and a reminder that I need to read your blog more often.

[Dead & Messed Up]

10. Other Gods (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment.html)
Hellboy, Guillermo del Toro 2004

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Tiurl2qTJfI/TpHm2PxePSI/AAAAAAAAAZM/QAPNtlpWS8w/s1600/Lovecraft-HellboyA.jpg

Atal could not hear the voices Barzai heard, but he was now close to the bulging cliff and scanning it for foot-holds. Then he heard Barzai's voice grow shriller and louder:

"The mists are very thin, and the moon casts shadows on the slope; the voices of earth's gods are high and wild, and they fear the coming of Barzai the Wise, who is greater than they..."


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f5jkR68f-2g/TpHm2x6oGMI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/3bc0E6iy7us/s1600/Lovecraft-HellboyB.jpg

While Barzai was shouting these things Atal felt a spectral change in the air, as if the laws of earth were bowing to greater laws...and as Atal plunged upward through the mists he heard Barzai the Wise shrieking in the shadows:


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UVAg1Jf46EM/TpHm3YqyEHI/AAAAAAAAAZU/m6kKLXX3OE4/s1600/Lovecraft-HellboyC.jpg

"The moon is dark, and the gods dance in the night; there is terror in the sky, for upon the moon hath sunk an eclipse foretold in no books of men or of earth's gods...


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eTJLz5iX-sk/TpHm4FnSBfI/AAAAAAAAAZY/V3ONzyXSzUA/s1600/Lovecraft-HellboyD.jpg

...there is unknown magic on Hatheg-Kla, for the screams of the frightened gods have turned to laughter, and the slopes of ice shoot up endlessly into the black heavens whither I am plunging...hei! Hei! At last! In the dim light I behold the gods of earth!"


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--Foj70MkusU/TpHm4-dyqfI/AAAAAAAAAZc/ucd7f8m7qno/s1600/Lovecraft-HellboyE.jpg

And now Atal, slipping dizzily up over inconceivable steeps, heard in the dark a loathsome laughing, mixed with such a cry as no man else ever heard save in the Phlegethon of unrelatable nightmares; a cry wherein reverberated the horror and anguish of a haunted lifetime packed into one atrocious moment:


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kdvfEh9zmG8/TpHm5hTXsEI/AAAAAAAAAZg/Mt-wUWUz8qk/s1600/Lovecraft-HellboyF.jpg

"The other gods! The other gods! The gods of the outer hells that guard the feeble gods of earth!...Look away!...Go back!...Do not see!...Do not see!...The vengeance of the infinite abysses...That cursed, that damnable pit...Merciful gods of earth, I am falling into the sky!"


"The Other Gods"

[megladon8]

I've always loved that moment in Hellboy.

I wish del Toro would merge his At the Mountains of Madness movie with Hellboy 3, and just make a movie of Hellboy vs. Cthulhu.

God that would rock.

Why have we not yet received a bid-budget Lovecraft film?

[Spun Lepton]

I've always loved that moment in Hellboy.

I wish del Toro would merge his At the Mountains of Madness movie with Hellboy 3, and just make a movie of Hellboy vs. Cthulhu.

God that would rock.

Why have we not yet received a bid-budget Lovecraft film?

Despite the fact the horror community worships Lovecraft, the general public has never (or rarely) heard of him. He's not really a name to drive people to the theater. Studios want a sure thing, not a gamble.

[MadMan]

Entry #10 kind of made my skin crawl. I'm now reminded of why I haven't read too much Lovecraft-any passages I've skimmed or read from his works has been really goddamn creepy to me. The thought of gods from other neither worlds capable of devouring people among other terrible things is quite disturbing.

PS: I just realized I've seen all of the movies on DaMU's list. Huh.

[Dead & Messed Up]

9. Devolution (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-9.html)
The Descent, Neil Marshall 2005

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-LFXxtSFKLZk/TpH6DvMSS9I/AAAAAAAAAaA/oiqaPiEvT9I/s1600/Lovecraft-Descent1.jpg

Every second I was consumed with a mixture of fear and curiosity. What would the storm call forth--or was there anything left for it to call?...


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fnm216eacxg/TpH6Ed8IzNI/AAAAAAAAAaE/Zhi5JmhWfpo/s1600/Lovecraft-Descent2.jpg

If heaven is merciful, it will some day efface from my consciousness the sight that I saw...


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-OyQTFe1OZLU/TpH6EwuTnYI/AAAAAAAAAaI/d4ySHzZz91s/s1600/Lovecraft-Descent3.jpg

The thing came abruptly and unannounced; a demon, ratlike scurrying from pits remote and unimaginable, a hellish panting and stifled grunting, and then from that opening beneath the chimney a burst of multitudinous and leprous life...


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Ta4rvefU8DI/TpH6Fk8b9iI/AAAAAAAAAaM/Fl2pqnYHlQo/s1600/Lovecraft-Descent4.jpg

...a loathsome night-spawned flood of organic corruption more devastatingly hideous than the blackest conjurations of mortal madness and morbidity...to see the stream of them in that faint, intermittent lightning was shocking.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qWttUgM6z8U/TpH6GLWeW4I/AAAAAAAAAaQ/WgsH2df_nlk/s1600/Lovecraft-Descent5.jpg

When they had thinned out enough to be glimpsed as separate organisms, I saw that they were dwarfed, deformed...devils or apes - monstrous and diabolic caricatures of the monkey tribe. They were so hideously silent...


"The Lurking Fear"

[Scar]

Alright, where should one start with Lovecraft?

[Grouchy]

Alright, where should one start with Lovecraft?
The Strange Case of Charles Dexter Ward is where I started. I think it's a good entry point. Short, and not as wearying as reading a bunch of short stories in a row.

I'm loving this, by the way.

[Spinal]

9. Devolution (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-9.html)
The Descent, Neil Marshall 2005


Yes! Yes! Yes!

[Spun Lepton]

Alright, where should one start with Lovecraft?

The Call of Cthulhu

Pickman's Model, The Colour Out of Space, The Dunwich Horror, The Dreams in the Witch House, Charles Dexter Ward. If you're looking for something longer, try At the Mountains of Madness.

[Dead & Messed Up]

And "The Music of Erich Zann." That one is fabulous.

[Scar]

If I had a Kindle, I could get his complete works for $0.99.

[Winston*]

If I had a Kindle, I could get his complete works for $0.99.

Actually you could get them legally for free, here.

http://cthulhuchick.com/free-complete-lovecraft-ebook-nook-kindle/

[Winston*]

The Rats in the Walls is the one that's creeped me of the few I've read.

[MadMan]

The Rats in the Walls is the one that's creeped me of the few I've read.I thought that DaMU would be referencing that one sooner rather than later.

I still haven't seen The Descent. The trailer for it put the fear of God into me. Maybe I'll brave it this October. Its funny that I'm a huge wimp, yet I love horror movies.

[D_Davis]

The Call of Cthulhu

Pickman's Model, The Colour Out of Space, The Dunwich Horror, The Dreams in the Witch House, Charles Dexter Ward. If you're looking for something longer, try At the Mountains of Madness.

You could probably start, and end, with this list.


I've got a huge, fat volume that contains everything he ever wrote that I'll sell anyone here for $20.

Even though I love some of his stuff, I've simply come to the conclusion that I really don't like Lovecraft much. I greatly prefer most of his contemporaries, the authors that inspired him, and the authors that he inspired.

PM me if anyone is interested.

BTW, great thread idea, and I love the execution. :up!:

[Dead & Messed Up]

Even though I love some of his stuff, I've simply come to the conclusion that I really don't like Lovecraft much. I greatly prefer most of his contemporaries, the authors that inspired him, and the authors that he inspired.

I think his skills were in pushing the conceptual boundaries of horror and painting with his deliciously overwrought prose, but there are some significant failings with his writings, particularly his inability to craft character and his face-palm-inducing racism. His very best stories mute those problems, but he was never able to fix them.

[D_Davis]

I agree. He was a brilliant ideas man, that's a fact. I think that's why I like the authors he inspired more; they took his ideas and executed them better.

I also applaud his use of early creative commons, allowing other authors to use and build upon his creations. That's entirely admirable.

[Dead & Messed Up]

8. Shrine (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-8.html)
Dagon, Stuart Gordon 2001

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LsUHruTO4u8/TpIiVY6URGI/AAAAAAAAAao/VFN8KyBnikM/s1600/Lovecraft-Dagon1.jpg

My impulse to visit and enter the temple has now become an inexplicable and imperious command which ultimately cannot be denied. My own German will no longer controls my acts, and volition is henceforward possible only in minor matters.


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZWMwvmNLfq8/TpIiVwXlCvI/AAAAAAAAAas/7j9rWj2ySU0/s1600/Lovecraft-Dagon2.jpg

Such madness it was which drove Klenze to his death, bareheaded and unprotected in the ocean; but I am a Prussian and man of sense, and will use to the last what little will I have.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8_uJBpOBAo4/TpIiWlX8ZjI/AAAAAAAAAaw/NGEWS_6QwEk/s1600/Lovecraft-Dagon3.jpg

When first I saw that I must go, I prepared my diving suit, helmet, and air regenerator for instant donning; and immediately commence to write this hurried chronicle in the hope that it may some day reach the world. I shall seal the manuscript in a bottle and entrust it to the sea as I leave the U-29 forever.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-jO6hMt9hTx4/TpIiXpk4oQI/AAAAAAAAAa0/PuJT32XfjAY/s1600/Lovecraft-Dagon4.jpg

I have no fear, not even from the prophecies of the madman Klenze. What I have seen cannot be true, and I know that this madness of my own will at most lead only to suffocation when my air is gone. The light in the temple is a sheer delusion, and I shall die calmly, like a German, in the black and forgotten depths.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-rHecWQuulIA/TpIiYTIhtVI/AAAAAAAAAa4/OO31YeGal7Q/s1600/Lovecraft-Dagon5.jpg

This daemoniac laughter which I hear as I write comes only from my own weakening brain. So I will carefully don my diving suit and walk boldly up the steps into that primal shrine; that silent secret of unfathomed waters and uncounted years.


"The Temple"

[D_Davis]

Dagon is surprisingly good.

[megladon8]

Yep. It's one of my favorite Lovecraft adaptations, and my second favorite Gordon film.

Love it.

[Dead & Messed Up]

7. Octopus God (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-7.html)
The Little Mermaid, Musker and Clements 1989

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-30YYzkG3gQM/TpH-B26i8EI/AAAAAAAAAaU/bGfiIaT4MF8/s1600/Lovecraft-Mermaid1.jpg

...bolder than the storied Cyclops, great Cthulhu slid greasily into the water and began to pursue with vast wave-raising strokes of cosmic potency...


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bN8bAomASc0/TpH-CqTsyvI/AAAAAAAAAaY/eNv-KVo-9Qc/s1600/Lovecraft-Mermaid2.jpg

But Johansen had not given out yet. Knowing that the Thing could surely overtake the Alert until steam was fully up, he resolved on a desperate chance; and, setting the engine for full speed, ran lightning-like on deck and reversed the wheel.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gFWN094ImdA/TpH-Dr5rBEI/AAAAAAAAAac/KuePH61Nl9c/s1600/Lovecraft-Mermaid3.jpg

There was a mighty eddying and foaming in the noisome brine, and as the steam mounted higher and higher the brave Norwegian drove his vessel head on gainst the pursuing jelly which rose above the unclean froth like the stern of a daemon galleon.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-93fcvALLSiY/TpH-EY6iZ-I/AAAAAAAAAag/CC6jMP2Fbaw/s1600/Lovecraft-Mermaid4.jpg

The awful squid-head with writhing feelers came nearly up to the bowsprit of the sturdy yacht, but Johansen drove on relentlessly.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cOpOsQNktmc/TpH-FavLx6I/AAAAAAAAAak/YAjLjYLkCQs/s1600/Lovecraft-Mermaid5.jpg

There was a bursting as of an exploding bladder, a slushy nastiness as of a cloven sunfish, a stench as of a thousand open graves, and a sound that the chronicler would not put on paper.


"The Call of Cthulhu"

[MadMan]

Dagon is Gordan flick I still need to get to.

Even though I still don't like The Little Mermaid, thanks to DaMU I'll never look at it the same way again.

[Grouchy]

Infinite points for originality.

[Dead & Messed Up]

6. Remains (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-6.html)
The Thing, John Carpenter 1982

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-c2ECN83XCs8/TpJdy5V3N2I/AAAAAAAAAcM/KOD0KclZglw/s1600/Lovecraft-Thing1.jpg

It is only with vast hesitancy and repugnance that I let my mind go back to Lake's camp and what we really found there...


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-YNs3kbKd1zQ/TpJdzT_3QkI/AAAAAAAAAcQ/Y0DCzgZQS9o/s1600/Lovecraft-Thing2.jpg

I have told of the wind-ravaged terrain, the damaged shelters, the disarranged machinery...


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1jW-6d66bZE/TpJd0rdx3GI/AAAAAAAAAcY/A7IzVYgyxb0/s1600/Lovecraft-Thing4.jpg

...the varied uneasinesses of our dogs, the missing sledges, and other items, the deaths of men and dogs,


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xSJLdKmTA70/TpJd1pb6uuI/AAAAAAAAAcc/79wdir4lwWU/s1600/Lovecraft-Thing5.jpg

...the absence of Gedney, and the six insanely buried biological specimens...from a world forty-million years dead.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZWF845sujls/TpJny8gPD7I/AAAAAAAAAco/wOGHnuoOOB0/s1600/Lovecraft-Thing8.jpg

The principal things I have been keeping back relate to the bodies, and to certain subtle points which may or may not lend a hideous and incredible kind of rationale to the apparent chaos...


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-e7uX-jPoRlA/TpJd2CMUzZI/AAAAAAAAAcg/QXYKJjIJWkc/s1600/Lovecraft-Thing6.jpg

The crowning abnormality, of course, was the condition of the bodies--men and dogs alike. They had all been in some terrible kind of conflict, and were torn and mangled in fiendish and altogether inexplicable ways.


"At the Mountains of Madness"

[megladon8]

Two very cool entries, DaMU. I think I will officially never see The Little Mermaid the same way again :)

Really liked the passage you chose, too. One of my favorite Cthulhu encounters.

[MadMan]

I'm not surprised that The Thing (1982) made a well deserved appearance on this list.

[Dead & Messed Up]

#5 contains SPOILERS for Frank Darabont's The Mist!


5. Behemoth (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-5-mist.html)
The Mist, Frank Darabont 2007

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lZtORZem8js/TpJAK2yEimI/AAAAAAAAAbM/i58XUsBaw24/s1600/Lovecraft-Mist1.jpg

...I stood musing whilst the moon cast queer reflections on the silent channel before me.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xOx2_n87Y0U/TpJALciAfzI/AAAAAAAAAbQ/xhey4DDYPhI/s1600/Lovecraft-Mist2.jpg

Then suddenly I saw it.


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-da2FrOAgtU4/TpJALxM2kjI/AAAAAAAAAbU/bKR5Fq36Z2o/s1600/Lovecraft-Mist3.jpg

With only a slight churning to mark its rise to the surface, the thing slid into view above the dark waters. Vast, Polyphemus-like, and loathsome, it darted like a stupendous monster of nightmares...


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-J-AAP9F9c4U/TpJEVud3jBI/AAAAAAAAAbg/pLYZxwIyE4M/s1600/Lovecraft-Mist6.jpg

...about which it flung its gigantic scaly arms, the while it bowed its hideous head and gave vent to certain measured sounds.


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Lu1BxMC_V7w/TpJEWRSGsgI/AAAAAAAAAbk/hN34SFqnwuE/s1600/Lovecraft-Mist7.jpg

I think I went mad then.


"Dagon"

[Dead & Messed Up]

4. They Came From Beneath the Sea! (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-4.html)Cthulhu, Dan Gildark 2007

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1e2L-7yBgtE/TpI-hYBAMDI/AAAAAAAAAa8/VziFV8IRUGM/s1600/Lovecraft-Cthulhu1.jpg

I could have imagined--nothing, even, that I could have gathered had I credited old Zadok's crazy tale in the most literal way--would be in any way comparable to the daemoniac, blasphemous reality that I saw--or believe I saw.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-SrfcMVYvrJg/TpI-jNWNoMI/AAAAAAAAAbA/l75HMhBfsBE/s1600/Lovecraft-Cthulhu2.jpg

I have tried to hint what it was in order to postpone the horror of writing it down baldly. Can it be possible that this planet has actually spawned such things; that human eyes have truly seen, as objective flesh, what man has hitherto known only in febrile phantasy and tenuous legend?


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pmasDSTHyCQ/TpI-jz07ydI/AAAAAAAAAbE/FBKoPXojXDI/s1600/Lovecraft-Cthulhu3.jpg

And yet I saw them in a limitless stream--flopping, hopping, croaking, bleating--surging inhumanly through the spectral moonlight in a grotesque, malignant saraband of fantastic nightmare...


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5Gxypf5ILpk/TpI-kaOrRvI/AAAAAAAAAbI/PvErHARkAEc/s1600/Lovecraft-Cthulhu5.jpg

Their number was past guessing. It seemed to me that there were limitless swarms of them--and certainly my momentary glimpse could have shewn only the least fraction.


"The Shadow Over Innsmouth"

[MadMan]

Those are some glorious screen caps. And the main reason I've put off watching The Mist is because I am unable to get my hands on the black and white version, which I would rather see over the one in color.

I'm guessing that Cthullhu is this movie:

ChFvCf56FZ0

Also I'm wondering if any In The Mouth of Madness (1995) scenes will make it onto your list.

[Dead & Messed Up]

Also I'm wondering if any In The Mouth of Madness (1995) scenes will make it onto your list.

:cool:

[Spun Lepton]

Cthulhu, Dan Gildark 2007


PHOOEY!!

Next thing, you'll post one from a Fessenden movie and I'll be forced to burn down the thread.

[Dead & Messed Up]

PHOOEY!!

Next thing, you'll post one from a Fessenden movie and I'll be forced to burn down the thread.

Whatever your judgment of the film as a whole, that moment is epically Lovecraft. The blue ocean waters, the music, the long take that swoops up to reveal fish-people crawling out of the sea.

[Scar]

PHOOEY!!

Next thing, you'll post one from a Fessenden movie and I'll be forced to burn down the thread.

Let's burn this motherfucker down!

[MadMan]

Let's burn this motherfucker down!:lol:

And hey at least he didn't go super obvious and include Call of Chullhu on his list, at least not yet :P

[Dead & Messed Up]

:lol:

And hey at least he didn't go super obvious and include Call of Chullhu on his list, at least not yet :P

:cool:

[Dead & Messed Up]

3. Racism (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-3-king.html)
King Kong, Merian C. Cooper 1933
The Call of Cthulhu, Andrew Leven 2005

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ptKK_Uv1z2Q/TqeXGfpIjMI/AAAAAAAAAds/TRMJ41y4D4w/s1600/Lovecraft-Racism6.jpg

Suddenly a ray of physical light shot through these phantasms, and Malone heard the sound of oars amidst the blasphemies of things that should be dead.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kGbZQd7DtMY/TqeXHKAZEdI/AAAAAAAAAd0/Hzq82LYrliE/s1600/Lovecraft-Racism7.jpg

A boat with a lantern in its prow darted into sight, made fast to an iron ring in the slimy stone pier, and vomited forth several dark men bearing a long burden...


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ObBNVzV4j6w/TqeO8539ogI/AAAAAAAAAdU/WkIlkf610BU/s1600/Lovecraft-Racism3.jpg

They took it to the...thing on the carved golden pedestal...


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Uz8S1IGKhBA/TqeO-GnAFFI/AAAAAAAAAdk/W4FauJH-DzI/s1600/Lovecraft-Racism5.jpg

The strange dark men danced in the rear, and the whole column skipped and leaped with Dionysiac fury. Malone staggered after them a few steps, delirious and hazy, and doubtful of his place in this or in any world.


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-porj2maezRI/TqeX7ZJlu2I/AAAAAAAAAd8/bsJI-SYSnKw/s1600/Lovecraft-Racism8.jpg

Vaguely he was conscious of chanted horrors and shocking croakings afar off. Now and then a wail or whine of ceremonial devotion would float to him through the black arcade...


"The Horror at Red Hook"

[megladon8]

OoOoOo...love the photo comparison between King Kong and The Call of Cthulhu.


DaMU - you should really check out the two-part "Justice League" episode, "The Terror Beyond".

It's basically the Justice League vs. Cthulhu, and works as a showcase for Solomon Grundy as a sympathetic monster.

It's really great stuff.

[MadMan]

I've never considered King Kong to be a horror movie, but that's not what's important here. Funny enough both it and Call of Cthulhu get the same rating, but I prefer the latter movie overall, even if King Kong is far more entertaining.

Also now I'm left to wonder what's #1.

[Dead & Messed Up]

I've never considered King Kong to be a horror movie, but that's not what's important here.

Little Mermaid should've tipped you off to that.

[Scar]

I've never considered King Kong to be a horror movie, but that's not what's important here. Funny enough both it and Call of Cthulhu get the same rating, but I prefer the latter movie overall, even if King Kong is far more entertaining.

Also now I'm left to wonder what's #1.

Considering how horrified audiences were when it was released, I'd consider King Kong a horror movie.

[MadMan]

Considering how horrified audiences were when it was released, I'd consider King Kong a horror movie.Oh come on, it was the 1930s. People were really easy to scare back then.


Little Mermaid should've tipped you off to that.Well yeah. If you were sticking to just horror, I would have a better idea of what your last two entries would be.

[Dead & Messed Up]

2. Oblivion
In the Mouth of Madness, John Carpenter 1995

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tyFJLJl65nU/TobPNNwqrBI/AAAAAAAAAXk/LzOpC3gZcsI/s1600/Lovecraft-InMouth1.jpg

...the chill wind rushed in, making the candles sputter and rustling the sheets of paper on the table where Zann had begun to write out his horrible secret. I looked at Zann, and saw that he was past conscious observation. His blue eyes were bulging, glassy and sightless, and the frantic playing had become a blind, mechanical, unrecognizable orgy that no pen could even suggest.


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-YTIx0AkDBmU/TpHpjzeswtI/AAAAAAAAAZk/zIPWvQ3Ohg0/s1600/Lovecraft-InMouth6.jpg

A sudden gust, stronger than the others, caught up the manuscript and bore it toward the window. I followed the flying sheets in desperation, but they were gone before I reached the demolished panes. Then I remembered my old wish to gaze from this window, the only window in the Rue d’Auseil from which one might see the slope beyond the wall, and the city outspread beneath.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bHnnvDlhjcs/TobPOLgOydI/AAAAAAAAAXo/bFnZxHbxIm0/s1600/Lovecraft-InMouth2.jpg

It was very dark, but the city’s lights always burned, and I expected to see them there amidst the rain and wind.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-dYGbli4Biv4/TobPO0EWhQI/AAAAAAAAAXs/LHWKgB_1Tjc/s1600/Lovecraft-InMouth3.jpg

Yet when I looked from that highest of all gable windows, looked while the candles sputtered and the insane viol howled with the night-wind, I saw no city spread below, and no friendly lights gleamed from remembered streets, but only the blackness of space illimitable; unimagined space alive with motion and music, and having no semblance of anything on earth.


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EpKdgEqzNNY/TobPP0605FI/AAAAAAAAAXw/bxxuZAN82LY/s1600/Lovecraft-InMouth4.jpg

And as I stood there looking in terror, the wind blew out both the candles in that ancient peaked garret, leaving me in savage and impenetrable darkness with chaos and pandemonium before me, and the demon madness of that night-baying viol behind me.


"The Music of Erich Zann"

[MadMan]

HELL YES. When I blind bought that movie from Hollywood Video as they were going out of business, I was a bit concerned that some of the negative opinions of it meant I wasn't making a good purchase. Thank God I ignored those, because I think its one of Carpenter's best movies.

The scene you posted screen caps from ends up having some poor CGI/FX later on, but I don't mind. Its still weird and creepy as hell. BTW, my favorite moment in that movie, amazing hilarious and disturbing ending aside, is when Neil wakes up on the bus. Everything is blue, and he just starts screaming while everyone else ignores him. Fantastic.

[Dead & Messed Up]

1. Black Seas of Infinity (http://horrorfilms101.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-lovecraft-movie-moment-1.html)Alien, Ridley Scott 1979

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cnAvrwdwmXo/TpJTs0USesI/AAAAAAAAAcE/bPVTrJBOr70/s1600/Lovecraft-Alien10.jpg

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-EbhFWdiSkyw/TpJTtsCAaGI/AAAAAAAAAcI/3lnf0z1mKlo/s1600/Lovecraft-Alien11.jpg

We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far.


http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xYltnvQeFcA/TpJRmwz7umI/AAAAAAAAAbo/awmXmdskYXA/s1600/Lovecraft-Alien1.jpg

The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little...


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-lFFCnnCt77c/TpJRnV59gII/AAAAAAAAAbs/_d_-TYE0DzM/s1600/Lovecraft-Alien2.jpg

...but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-D_9fimywKhg/TpJRor23AUI/AAAAAAAAAbw/GWgWk2ellYY/s1600/Lovecraft-Alien3.jpg

Theosophists have guessed at the awesome grandeur of the cosmic cycle wherein our world and human race form transient incidents.


http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YcAkdKOPKAI/TpJRptZPnUI/AAAAAAAAAb4/VC602N2WMXg/s1600/Lovecraft-Alien5.jpg

They have hinted at strange survivals in terms which would freeze the blood...


http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mpyR9OE0wJk/TpJRrF87gPI/AAAAAAAAAcA/FY6nGzbOSus/s1600/Lovecraft-Alien7.jpg

But it is not from them that there came the single glimpse of forbidden aeons which chills me when I think of it and maddens me when I dream of it.


"The Call of Cthulhu"

[Dead & Messed Up]

Happy Halloween!

:pritch:

[MadMan]

Alien being #1 was a tad expected, but hey its a masterpiece and deserves that spot. Awesome list, DaMU.

[Spinal]

A thread for the ages. Well done.

[Glass Co.]

Yup, a hearty well done to you, sir.

[megladon8]

Sorry to be late to the show, but great thread DaMU.

Loved all the images you chose, and the words you paired them with. Really great stuff.

[D_Davis]

OoOoOo...love the photo comparison between King Kong and The Call of Cthulhu.


Yeah, I agree. Nicely done.

[Dead & Messed Up]

Thanks guys! I now want to never think about Lovecraft again.

Conveniently, a Huffpost article actually offered a solid list of horror books and authors (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-ambler/halloween-books-_b_1066471.html#s442629&title=Ghost_Stories_of) outside the mainstream. Was not expecting that from Huffpost.

William Hope Hodgson, here I come.

[Winston*]

Awesome thread.

Was just re-reading Heart of Darkness last night. Funny how similar the language is:

"I think I would have raised an outcry if I had believed my eyes. But I didn't believe them at first -- the thing seemed so impossible. The fact is I was completely unnerved by a sheer blank fright, pure abstract terror, unconnected with any distinct shape of physical danger. What made this emotion so overpowering was -- how shall I define it? -- the moral shock I received, as if something altogether monstrous, intolerable to thought and odious to the soul, had been thrust upon me unexpectedly. "

[D_Davis]

William Hope Hodgson, here I come.

I like him a lot.