Review of The Call of Cthulhu (2006) by Darrin B — 14 Jun 2008

I will firmly though sadly say this is the only true adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's short story/novelette "The Call of Cthulhu" that has ever or probably will ever be made. This is simply because most of Lovecraft's work does not or is not considered to cater well to the film format.

Not only do they stick the story with out any noticeable liberties taken, but they manage to preserve the story-in-a-story-in-a-story format very well.

What's more, the entire film is deliberately filmed in a degraded (in post-production) silent filmstock complete with title cards and highly melodramatic nonstop musical accompaniment typical of the period. The effects for the titular character are no more sophisticated than those of the original King Kong but with cleaver use of camera angle and cuts they manage to keep even their stop motion figurine reasonably intimidating.

The premise is essentially that long before there came any form of life we know of today, there once reigned on Earth a myriad of races and cultures from beyond the known universe (one of which is indirectly reponsible for accidentally creating the string of evolutionary cruft that would spawn mankind) and operating on scopes we can not understand nor should we try to, for even a glimpse of the truth would drive one mad (and often does.) One of these beings of near God-like grandeur, by the name of Cthulhu, came to earth and settled in the sea along with his race of star-spawn. He was however at one point imprisoned (either by his own choice or as banishment) to the vaults of his great city Rl'yeh which sunk deep into the Pacific. When the stars are right it will rise again and the world will descend into amoral chaos but until then, he only exerts his influence every couple years or so. This is how he convinces men to form cults in his honour that will facilitate his return. Long story short (no pun intended), the narrator stumbles upon a string of seemingly unrelated tales that bring him closer to understanding the Cthulhu cults and ultimately to learning the grim event of a ship that accidentally stumbled upon the temporarily risen city and lived to talk about it.

The pacing is a little clunky at times and even for a 47 minute film it will feel longer but if you're familiar with the source material and can dig the 1920s cinema style, this is a real gem. A magnificent effort and an exemplar - showing that the mythos can be taken verbatim and still succeed on celluloid.