For the love of Lovecraft

I want to open by saying I love the work of H.P. Lovecraft, I'm a huge fan. I'm also obviously a big fan of horror movies and more specifically the tense, story-telling type tales. So you'd think it would be a natural fit that I would like movies based on or "inspired by" Lovecraft works. BZZT! Wrong. There has been a grand total of one (1) film made based on Lovecraft fiction that I have enjoyed, and it is Dagon. I've heard good things about Re-Animator but alas I have yet to see it. Both movies are directed by Stuart Gordon, so the man obviously knows how to handle his Lovecraft. Anyway, on with the show.

We open with a dream sequence which isn't immediately effective, but on second or third viewings it becomes more apparent. The following scene on the boat with lead player Paul (Ezra Godden) and his girl Barbara (Raquel Meroño) (maybe a reference to Barbara Crampton of Re-Animator and From Beyond?) along with Howard (Brendan Price) and his wife Vicky (Birgit Bofarull) serve to remind us that Dagon is in fact a low-budget feature. Everything after this, aside from Paul's unnecessary over acting in the first part of the movie, shows us what a good filmmaker can do with a little creativity and a lot of heart. The foursome is taking a trip to celebrate Paul's newfound wealth when they crash into a rock and Vicky gets her leg stuck in the boat.. somehow. It's implied that her blood awakens something, and Howard refuses to leave his wife so Paul and Barbara head to shore in a dingy which shortly springs a leak. They make it to land safe and sound after a bit more unnecessary comedy and a few oddly compelling tension shots both on the dingy and in the big boat with Howard and Vicky.

Upon reaching shore, Barbara instinctively knows the townspeople must speak spanish.. ? They do! Well that's lucky. A priestly looking individual tells the couple that he will take Barbara to the next town over to bring the police to help. Paul decides to stay in the hotel (yes the hotel, as in singular), where he finds a nice older gentleman who either doesn't or can't speak and has gills in his neck. Paul does what any of us would do, he takes a room for the night. Upstairs in his room he sees Barbara, which turns out to be the woman from his dream (Uxía, played by Macarena Gómez) and Paul is just hallucinating. After being chased out of his room by a creepy stumbly mumbly horde he finds himself falling into a chamber filled with flayed skin and faces that have been hung out to dry and we meet Ezequial (Francisco Rabal) aka our expository dialogue vendor. He gives a firsthand account of the town of Imbocca and how it came to be populated by fish zombies. Then comes the dreaded capture and escape x4 that if you're really lost in the movie won't bother you too much, but if you're only paying a bit of attention, or if you're not drawn in by this point, you will lose all hope of enjoying the movie right about now. The plot is moved along throughout these captures and escapes and we learn more about Uxía and what Dagon has in mind for the offerings his followers have captured for him. After the final escape of Paul, we're treated to what I thought was an incredibly strong finish, mainly because of Macarena Gómez's extremely real and serious treatment of the subject matter. The crowd of Imboccanos wearing skin faces and the perfectly grotesque final shot of Barbara were big pluses as well.

It's hard to illustrate exactly how they created the feel of this movie, of isolation and of a strong backstory and mythos which are all central feelings in Lovecrafts own work. I wanted to (try to) hilight a very good job done by Gordon in bringing those feelings to life on the screen, a task which many have tried and failed miserably. Dagon's strength lies in the fact that Gordon understands how to translate the source material to the screen and that the actors don't play their roles like they're in a B movie, which they most certainly are, but they play them completely straight. Add in some heavy duty makeup effects and minimal use of CG and you have a recipe for a strained budget that exceeds expectations and really has won a place among my favorite movies.

Gripes are non-existant if you are pulled into the movie as I mentioned. Small things from the dream sequence pop up throughout the movie, the fish language was really interesting in that it sounded very coherent and cohesive, it sounded like they were all speaking the same, if fake, language. The makeup effects deserve another mention as they really were top notch and I actually looked away the last time I watched as they skinned one of the cast members face and back. The location serves the atmosphere perfectly and it is shot expertly. The camerawork reminded me of Evil Dead a few times, and that's a good thing. If however you are looking for something to disike or if it just doesn't grab you, you will find a lot of very silly acting by Ezra Godden for the first 30 minutes or so and some absolutely ridiculous decisions being made; staying in the hotel in the first place, ignoring the fish zombie crowd heading up to him, then trying to keep them out with the smallest deadbolt I've ever seen stands out as particularly ill-advised. There are also little things like Paul's total dependance on his glasses when they're just out of reach or broken, but not having any effect on him later in the movie once he's put on his tough guy persona that can bring it down. But really, a good movie deserves your suspension of disbelief and this one earns it.