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[Darkmakaimura]

Hollywood has done things I never would have thought would come to pass, like Marvel crossovers and Infinity War.

Yet we never got an actual good movie directly based on Lovecraft but especially Cthulhu. There's been indie movies like Colors and b-movies but nothing beyond that.

One could argue The Thing remake from the 80s which was based off the original story which itself was very heavily inspired by At the Mountains of Madness.

(I wonder if irl long time fren MetalAlien knows this?)

Apparently Guillermo del Toro was going to do a film adaption but it was canned being too "similar" to the hit Kurt Russell movie.

At some point I think a Call of Cthulhu movie in the right hands as a AAA movie should be done.

 

[Darkmakaimura]

Fwiw imagine if Lovecraft was alive today or came back from the dead? And he would see how popular he is.... Movies both directly and indirectly based off his writings, music, Chaosium tabletop rpg, video games, a recent HBO show I'm sure he would completely adore, and a bunch of other stuff.

 

[jason10mm]

I'd argue that films like Cabin in the Woods or even Godzilla:King of the Monsters are essentially lovecraft films writ large. Plenty of video games like Dead Space take it to a AAA level as well. Lovecraft would be astounded I think.

 

[Deleted member 801069]

Lovecraft’s work, by definition, doesn’t lend itself well to visual media.

Color Out of Space came out last year and while not that bad, ultimately failed in attempting to depict the indescribable aspects of Lovecraftian horror

 

[Deleted member 801069]

a recent HBO show I'm sure he would completely adore, and a bunch of other stuff.

...you realize Lovecraft was racist, right? Don’t think he would be too fond of the show tbh.

Not to mention the show (and book it was based on) blow compared to Lovecraft’s literature.

 

[Tesseract]

in the mouth of madness gets reasonably close

 

[Deleted member 801069]

in the mouth of madness gets reasonably close

I like it and felt like it held up pretty well during my recent rewatch of it. Lots of the practical effects in it are pretty neat. Some documentary I recently watched covered them.

 

[jason10mm]

There was very little Lovecraft in LC the book, IMHO. I like to call it Bradbury Country because I think the sci-fi is more his level than HPLs.

 

[mango drank]

Color Out of Space came out last year and while not that bad, ultimately failed in attempting to depict the indescribable aspects of Lovecraftian horror

Came to post this. It had its moments, but was just all right.

 

[Deleted member 801069]

There was very little Lovecraft in LC the book, IMHO. I like to call it Bradbury Country because I think the sci-fi is more his level than HPLs.

I agree. I never finished the book tho. Got like 3/4 through and just lost interest.

I’m watching the show still but primarily because I kinda have a thing for Christina Braithwhite.

 

[Deleted member 801069]

Came to post this. It had its moments, but was just all right.

Have you seen Mandy? Same producers, sooo good.

 

[Nester99]

Could Cloverfield count?

 

[mango drank]

Have you seen Mandy? Same producers, sooo good.

Nuh-uh, I'll add it to my list.

 

[petran79]

I think Dagon (2001) was the best modern attempt at Lovecraft

 

[Deleted member 801069]

Nuh-uh, I'll add it to my list.

Might be my fav film of 2018 tbh

 

[Darkmakaimura]

...you realize Lovecraft was racist, right? Don’t think he would be too fond of the show tbh.

Not to mention the show (and book it was based on) blow compared to Lovecraft’s literature.

I know. That was the joke.

 

[Dr_Salt]

The Mist isn't AAA but it has some AAA names attached to it namely Frank Darabont and Marcia Gay Arden.

 

[Mr Hyde]

A big budget adaptation of H.P Lovecraft is too much of a risk for investors, no film studio would attempt it in today's safe and cookie cutter movie making.

Del Toro worked on an adaptation of At the Mountains of Madness for years, even going so far as to have Tom Cruise attached to it with a producing credit, but fell apart due to lack of financing.

John Carpenter made his own adaptation of HP Lovecraft, borrowing heavily from the authors work with his In the Mouth of Madness, which is probably the closest thing we got to a big budget Lovecraft movie, and it tanked at the box office and was not well received critically either (although the tune has changed in present times).

Stuart Gordon has made numerous attempts at adapting Lovecraft with low budget indies but they all failed miserably. The only one doing solid numbers was Re-Animator but the sequels were failures too.

If small movie adaptations with low budgets doesn't earn back its money how well do you think a AAA tentpole movie will do at the cinemas? It's box office poison.

 

[DKehoe]

Lovecraft’s work often hinges on the idea of horrors that are beyond our understanding and would drive you mad to even look upon them. It’s kinda hard to depict that in a medium where the audience will be looking directly at them. I’d be interested to see someone try of course. And I wish we’d gotten Del Toro’s At The Mountains Of Madness. But I think his stories work better in written form as often the most compelling aspects are those that your imagination can’t quite picture and so you are left wondering about them.

 

[Werewolf Jones]

HE WAS SOME MAD SHIT AND HE WENT INSANE, IT WAS SICK MATE, IT WAS SICK.

It's not gonna sell bro it only appeals to Internet weirdos.

Colour out of space was good and the Dunwich Horror is next.

 

[Tesseract]

HE WAS SOME MAD SHIT AND HE WENT INSANE, IT WAS SICK MATE, IT WAS SICK.

It's not gonna sell bro it only appeals to Internet weirdos.

Colour out of space was good and the Dunwich Horror is next.

sometimes you gotta fracture your mind into a million shards and put them back together like doctor manhattan

 

[The Cockatrice]

Could Cloverfield count?

Thats a good example. Haven't seen a great horror flick like that in ages.

 

[jason10mm]

A big budget adaptation of H.P Lovecraft is too much of a risk for investors, no film studio would attempt it in today's safe and cookie cutter movie making.

Del Toro worked on an adaptation of At the Mountains of Madness for years, even going so far as to have Tom Cruise attached to it with a producing credit, but fell apart due to lack of financing.

John Carpenter made his own adaptation of HP Lovecraft, borrowing heavily from the authors work with his In the Mouth of Madness, which is probably the closest thing we got to a big budget Lovecraft movie, and it tanked at the box office and was not well received critically either (although the tune has changed in present times).

Stuart Gordon has made numerous attempts at adapting Lovecraft with low budget indies but they all failed miserably. The only one doing solid numbers was Re-Animator but the sequels were failures too.

If small movie adaptations with low budgets doesn't earn back its money how well do you think a AAA tentpole movie will do at the cinemas? It's box office poison.

I dunno, Stuart (rip) has done a couple HPL adaptations and they are all good and pretty well budgeted for the material. I don't think HPL needs a huge budget, in fact he writes AGAINST using big showpiece displays. All the baddies are half seen, in the mists, or whatnot. I'm not sure why ATMoM was gonna be so expensive, its really just a tracking shot across Antarctica, a few rooms of murals easily done on a sound stage, and then the shoggogh effect which we've been doing since The Blob (another decent budget HPL influenced film x2). I'm sure DelToro wanted lots of elaborate flashbacks but those aren't needed.

 

[Mr Hyde]

Stuart (rip)

Stuart Gordon is fucking dead?!

That's sad news. Loved his movies. King of the Ants was the GOAT in his resume. Damn good filmmaker.

 

[IfuckinghateReddit]

It's easier to rip him off.

 

[jason10mm]

Stuart Gordon is fucking dead?!

That's sad news. Loved his movies. King of the Ants was the GOAT in his resume. Damn good filmmaker.

Yup, died in March. Great loss.

 

[MetalAlien]

Real life is doing a pretty good impression of a Lovecraft story.

 

[bender]

Real life is doing a pretty good impression of a Lovecraft story.

Quoth the raven never more..

 

[Red Crayon Aristocrat]

It's simple, you can't really do Lovecraft justice without making it a hard R, the bigger the budget, the less likely it is to be R rated at all, let alone a hard R.

When was the last time a big budget blockbuster movie was a hard R? Terminator 2 was rated R, but I would say it was a fairly "soft R", instead I can only think of Starship Troopers as the last big budget hard R, prior to that it would be Total Recall, so even when it was a thing that could be done, it was still usually pretty rare.

 

[TheSadRanger]

I heard a rumor that Underwater was originally supposed to be like that but the studio interfered and all of the psychology stuff got cut out and they re shot some scenes to make it more "popcorn" like.

Traces of it are still left when there's the scenes where Kristen Stewart is clutching her chest and thinking about her deceased fiancee. There was supposed to be a lot of cool mind fuck stuff with hallucinations and deep sea psychosis and it all got cut.

Another big trace of it is

Spoiler

the Cthuhlu monster at the end of the movie

 

[jason10mm]

Yeah, Underwater was decent. It felt like a lot got cut though.

 

[Deleted member 801069]

So Underwater is worth watching?

 

[TheSadRanger]

So Underwater is worth watching?

It's not terrible but it's a shame that it had so much potential wasted.

Instead of possibly being a modern classic like The Thing, it ended up being just a generic studio produced stereotypical romp.

Imagine

Spoiler

having a literal fucking

Spoiler

cthuhlu sea monster

Spoiler

which was a genuine surprise

and doing absolutely nothing with mindfuck psychology stuff.

 

[Husky]

Honestly the largest cosmic horror film I can think of is Sunshine, which gave the sun the same properties to stir madness as a Lovecraftian monster. But I do wish we could get a movie or series with a genuine mindfuck of a Lovecraft-style cosmic horror twist. Underwater tried, but without the mindfuck.
In the Mouth of Madness might be the most directly Lovecraft-inspired movie I've seen, but it was more like seeing someone else get mindfucked than being mindfucked myself.

At some points The Third Day has me wondering (hoping, really) that we'll get a twist like that. Folk horror meshes well with Lovecraft, I think. They probably won't though.

 

[farmerboy]

Not hugely familiar with Lovecraft or his writing, but seeing as cosmic horror seems to be one of the strong points, would Stranger Things qualify?

 

[OmegaSupreme]

Hellboy is Lovecraft as fuck. Especially the first film.

 

[TheSadRanger]

Honestly the largest cosmic horror film I can think of is Sunshine, which gave the sun the same properties to stir madness as a Lovecraftian monster. But I do wish we could get a movie or series with a genuine mindfuck of a Lovecraft-style cosmic horror twist. Underwater tried, but without the mindfuck.
In the Mouth of Madness might be the most directly Lovecraft-inspired movie I've seen, but it was more like seeing someone else get mindfucked than being mindfucked myself.

At some points The Third Day has me wondering (hoping, really) that we'll get a twist like that. Folk horror meshes well with Lovecraft, I think. They probably won't though.

I like Sunshine but looking back the whole dudes going crazy from looking at the sun doesn't make much sense lol. I still wonder wtf were the writers aiming for with that subplot when the movie was perfectly fine as a space exploration adventure.

It's like "Okay did anyone perform psych tests on these people before they sent them to space? Or did they just randomly decide to send a crazy person on the mission for the luls"

 

[ManaByte]

The Mist isn't AAA but it has some AAA names attached to it namely Frank Darabont and Marcia Gay Arden.

The Mist is a Stephen King story and the movie has a shit ending.

 

[Cato]

From Beyond. Not AAA but doesn't need to to be epic.

 

[TheSadRanger]

Lovecraft’s work, by definition, doesn’t lend itself well to visual media.

Color Out of Space came out last year and while not that bad, ultimately failed in attempting to depict the indescribable aspects of Lovecraftian horror

I have mixed thoughts about Color out of Space. I think it relied a little too much on body horror making it too similar to the Thing. Oddly enough I think Annihilation handled that particular aspect of cosmic horror better.

 

[Darkmakaimura]

I like Sunshine but looking back the whole dudes going crazy from looking at the sun doesn't make much sense lol. I still wonder wtf were the writers aiming for with that subplot when the movie was perfectly fine as a space exploration adventure.

It's like "Okay did anyone perform psych tests on these people before they sent them to space? Or did they just randomly decide to send a crazy person on the mission for the luls"

I never seem it but Bird Box sounds Lovecraftian; monsters that are never shown but if you see them they drive you insane and in the movie version make you commit suicide.

Apparently you see some drawings of the creatures briefly in the movie and they're all different but really disturbing.

 

[Deleted member 801069]

I never seem it but Bird Box sounds Lovecraftian; monsters that are never shown but if you see them they drive you insane and in the movie version make you commit suicide.

Apparently you see some drawings of the creatures briefly in the movie and they're all different but really disturbing.

Sandra Bullock’s acting drove me insane and almost made me commit suicide

 

[TheSadRanger]

Sandra Bullock’s acting drove me insane and almost made me commit suicide

The most Lovecraftian thing about Bird Box is a woman in her mid 50s getting preggorz.

 

[Stiflers Mom]

I have read almost any Lovecraft story existing, and to be honest, in a way there are plenty of Lovecraft inspired films around, and on the other side there are none.

That thing inbetween the lines is simply not easy to convert to film.

The cosmic horror. That feeling of helplessness when physics and the fabrics of the universe are not working anymore. Aeons old Entities beyond our human understanding.

Apart from that, what you are left with is a basic monster and/or cultist movie most of the time.

When people say "this is so Lovecraft" about something I usually don't understand why they think it is. To this day I don't have any idea what's Lovecraft about Bloodborne for instance.

 

[Dav-Kripler]

The Mist isn't AAA but it has some AAA names attached to it namely Frank Darabont and Marcia Gay Arden.

Wish it held up better also it feels more like Lovecraft through a stephen king filter. I would say the thing comes close. There was also this :

 

[lastmessiah]

One of the most important aspects of Lovecraft's work is the utter insignificance of humanity. Most movies with "Lovecraftian" elements ignore this in favor of more conventional narratives. This would be especially true for a big budget Hollywood film - it would have to have some stupid love interest subplot, "likable" characters, lame pandering to the Chinese market, etc.

Really the closest thing we've seen to a pure Lovecraft film is John Carpenter's The Thing - the characters don't matter except as ciphers through which to view the horror, and there is no hope and no happy ending. It's a great movie but flopped hard on release and was criticized for exactly the things that make it a great Lovecraft film.

 

[rofif]

Pontypool
Event Horizon
The Mist
The Thing

Ordered by budget from smaller to mediumeeeer

 

[Darkmakaimura]

Wish it held up better also it feels more like Lovecraft through a stephen king filter. I would say the thing comes close. There was also this :

The Mist and The Thing are probably my two favorite Lovecraft inspired movies. The Thing is pretty much just At The Mountains of Madness. But the ending to the original Lovecraft gives me chills....

Spoiler

where the guy at the end flying off in the helicopter from the mountains looks back and sees something so terrifying - most likely some entity - he goes insane and it's never described what he saw.

Pontypool
Event Horizon
The Mist
The Thing

Ordered by budget from smaller to mediumeeeer

Never heard of Pontypool but great choices. Event Horizon is good pick too.

 

[Darkmakaimura]

By the way, as far as video games go I HIGHLY recommend this, my guys.

It was actually what helped me discover H.P. Lovecraft when I was a tater tot with a C64.

 

[Dav-Kripler]

Want this getting a remake?