COLOR OUT OF SPACE

I worship at the altar of the Gordon/Yuzna Lovecraft cycle, but back in November I saw the Lovecraft film I’ve been waiting for my whole life (and literally since 2015 when it was first announced!). Richard Stanley’s COLOR OUT OF SPACE is the first direct adaptation of HPL’s work to truly capture the scale, terror and awe of his cosmic horror.

I've had an odd history with Richard Stanley. When I saw HARDWARE, during it's initial theatrical run back in '91, I had a viscerally negative reaction to it. I clearly wasn't ready for Stanley's brand of gonzo genre cinema. Jump forward almost three decades and I guess I'm at just the right place to appreciate his aesthetic now, because last year I rediscovered, reappraised and completely fell for his style. In the case of HARDWARE it wasn't until my third viewing (the excellent remastered blu-ray from Ronin) that I finally "got it". After that I sprung for the beautiful German boxset of DUST DEVIL (Koch Media) and was completely blown away by that too. A viewing of Severin's LOST SOUL: THE DOOMED JOURNEY OF RICHARD STANLEY'S THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU sealed the deal. I had discovered a visionary auteur... three decades too late!

Or was it? Because the whole reason I dove into his filmography last year was in anticipation of his adaptation of COLOR OUT OF SPACE, a film that marks his comeback after a couple of decades in seclusion and semi-retirement (if you don't count his documentary work). As a Lovecraft fan, I had to see what all the fuss was about with this eccentric artist who was bringing one of the master's finest stories to life on the big screen.

COLOR has certainly polarised fans of Lovecraft's writing, but this particular one falls very solidly in the "love it" camp. I'm not going to get into a detailed review here. Suffice it to say that this film is beautiful, terrifying, nightmarish, unhinged and fucking gnarly.

And it might just be a stealthy, brilliant parable about humanity's utter disregard for (and abuse of) our planet, and the mortal peril that has placed us in.

Take my word for it, this film is probably far more satisfying than del Toro's AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS would have been, and on a tiny fraction of that failed behemoth's proposed budget. SpectreVision and Stanley have recently made public a plan to expand this project to a trilogy of Lovecraft adaptations, the next of which could very well be THE DUNWICH HORROR. This will only likely happen if people get out and support COLOR.

It's out next month, so please go see it. With a group of friends. Twice. The alpacas will thank you.

AUTOPSY: 2019

Here it is, my final best-of list for the decade. The top ten for the year, and eight excellent runners-up.

THE BEST:
10. The Golden Glove
9. Lords of Chaos
8. Doctor Sleep
7. Ad Astra
6. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
5. Midsommar
4. The Lighthouse
3. Color out of Space
2. In Fabric
1. The Nightingale

THE REST:
Arctic
Come to Daddy
High Life
The Irishman
Parasite
The Perfection
Terminator: Dark Fate
Velvet Buzzsaw

BEST TV:
Chernobyl

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT:
Godzilla: King of the Monsters

MOST HIGHLY ANTICIPATED FOR 2020:
Dune

The Colour Out of Space

Great news today as SpectreVision has announced its plans to back Richard Stanley's adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's short story The Colour Out of Space. Stanley, whose Hardware is a certifiable DIY sci-fi classic, is just the kind of maverick director to tackle Lovecraft (see also Stuart Gordon). I'm far more interested in seeing his vision of HPL's universe than someone like del Toro (especially after learning of his plans for At the Mountains of Madness).

SpectreVision is the baby of Elijah "Maniac" Wood (a self professed horror freak) and Josh Waller (director of the Zoe Bell actioners Raze and the upcoming Camino), who envisioned it as a production company and distributor that specialises in quality indie horror/genre films. So far they've distributed some great flicks, including Ana Lily Amirpour's highly acclaimed A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, and have some cool looking movies in development (The Greasy Strangler). They're the perfect backers for a Stanley joint.

The word is that Stanley's screenplay is excellent. In his own words:

"There needs to be a scary Lovecraft movie. I want to make a bad trip film, and The Colour Out of Space definitely has what it takes to be a very, very bad trip indeed."

The story (said to be Lovecraft's personal favourite) is about a farm that is blighted by a mysterious meteorite, poisoning and mutating the surrounding countryside before sending the farm's residents insane... and worse. It's almost certainly the precursor of any number of similar sci-fi/horror stories, from The Blob and The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill to Night of the Creeps and Slither. It was adapted in 2010 (on a shoestring) by German filmmaker Huan Vu under the title Die Farbe.

Let's hope this one comes to fruition...