Now That's What I'm Talking About

As a geeky little kid H. P. Lovecraft was one of those things that was 'in my orbit,' so to speak. I was into role-playing games, and there was a role-playing game that I think I remember trying, or at least creating a character in. I had a complete volume of short stories that I read a few of. People who where into some of the things that I was into where into Lovecraft and Cthulhu. I would be a poser, though, to say that I was that into it.

But the movie that's been made I'm all about. Why? Because the filmmakers have decided to not only set it in the time period of the original story, but they have filmed it as if it was filmed in 1925-including being silent and only 47 minutes long. Looks like it's not going to be on a screen anywhere near me, the DVD is definatly on the list.

This is something that really intrigues me about modern filmmaking that really can only come about as a medium matures. Here the method of the filming is part of the narrative. The mise en scene has always been important in film, but this degree, not only what's on the film but how it was filmed, creates a new level of the narrative for the audience to interact with because the audience has an awareness of the medium. We're seeing this become more prominent, as with another film that uses this very technique, The Saddest Music in the World, the in the blending of documentary, narrative, and surrealist styles in the adaptation of American Splendor, or in the recent biopic of The Notorious Bettie Page that depicted the period of Page's life by emulating the film-stock of the photographs that she was taking at the time (grainy black and white in New York at the film clubs, over saturated color in Miami with Bunny Yeager). There are more examples, such as the super-genre love notes of Tarantino's Kill Bill and Conran's Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. It inspires me as an aspiring film maker and engages me as an active audience member.

I can only hope that Cthulhu and it's ilk are harbringers of things to come. Bravo.