Little known SF films

[Paaaaul]

Dagon is set in modern Spain, but as far as I can remember, the others are all period pieces.
...Witch House may be modern, but my memory fails me.
Castle Freak, based on The Outsider, probably worries too much about period detail to the detriment of everything else.

[Puce Moment]

From Beyond has dated horribly, but I remember loving it back in the day (I realised the other day that the scientist woman is also the main character in We Are Still Here). I really like that intense, bottle-episode feel to it - something you get in great films like 12 Angry Men and The Thing.

[another Mr. Lizard]

A chance to vote for a personal favourite here, TOMORROW I'LL WAKE UP AND SCALD MYSELF WITH TEA, a late 1970s Czech time travel yarn screened by the Beeb one Sunday night in their wonderful 'Film International' slot. In a world where time travel is now a commercial enterprise, a bunch of Nazi sympathisers intend to exploit the situation by heading back to the forties and... well you can probably write your own plot from that point on, but it's beautifully played, contains several surprises, and is one of the funniest sf movies out there. Pester BBC2 for a repeat screening.

[Ignatius_S]

I've still got to watch them though...got to.

There's something dark and compelling about Lovecraft's writing...sterile and austere yet quite mind expanding to read.

Are any of those adaptations period pieces or do they as Gordon's films do, place them in a modern setting? Something gets lost in that I feel.

Further to Paaaaul said, there's an excellent book called Lurker in the Lobby about this. When it looks to TV and film, it includes works that are based on Lovecraft's writing and ones that are argued to have clear Lovecraft influences, such as In the Mouth of Madness (which you mentioned) and Quartermass and the Pit. The central hypothesis is that Lovecraft has been incredibly influential in cinema – IIRC, there's an argument made that his work has been adapted or influenced films more than any other writer... I wouldn't go that far! The book also includes a number of interviews – e.g. Jeffrey Combs, Stuart Gordon, Dan O'Bannon – and that element is very interesting as well.

One adaptation that I would recommend is The Call of Cthulhu – it's a fan film done as a black and white, silent film and done in the period. However (as Paaaaul says) so many of the adaptations aren't much cop – and it's worth mentioning that some are, in effect, an adaptation in name only. In any case, you've got a lot of stuff to watch.

Slight tangent, but the other week but I was chatting to a friend who is an associate dear for art at one university and they mentioned to me that recently, there's been a surge of interest in Lovecraft, particularly in research.

[another Mr. Lizard]

I attend the Horror On Sea festival in Southend every year, a showcase for low-budget modern horror features. A highlight at this year's event was THE CALL GIRL OF CTHULHU. Every bit as good as its title.

[Puce Moment]

Watching The Quiet Earth now. Not sure how I have managed to avoid seeing this. It took me a good 12mins to even work out where it was set!

Loving it.

[steveh]

I'm not that big on most sci-fi but The Quiet Earth is one of my favourite films. Shame it still doesn't have a UK Blu-ray release. Anyone got the German one and know if it's a decent transfer?

The Brother From Another Planet is the story of an alien crash landing in Harlem pursued by two bounty hunters and the assumptions people make because of his black skin. A tiny budget but nicely shot and a really good central performance from Joe Morton.

Night of the Comet is more trashy but I still think is effective in the eighties low-budget dystopia category with its story of two valley girls who find themselves alone after a comet wipes out almost everyone. Recently turned up on Netflix.

I did wonder if Smith & Jones' Morons From Outer Space might have improved with age but on a recent viewing it turned out to be just as dire as I remembered from when it came out.

[phantom_power]

Night of the Comet is more trashy but I still think is effective in the eighties low-budget dystopia category with its story of two valley girls who find themselves alone after a comet wipes out almost everyone. Recently turned up on Netflix.

Yeah I watched this when it turned up on Netflix and really enjoyed it.

I also watched and enjoyed Miracle Mile, which fits into this thread. There is another odd 80s sci-fi film called Static which is also worth a look, about a man who claims to have invented a radio that can be tuned into heaven

[Ignatius_S]

Welcome to Blood City – for years, I haunted by the memory of this film but not its name, until Famous Mortimer saved me. Without giving too much away, people wake up in a small town similar to a frontier Wild West settlement with Jack Palance as the sheriff. Often compared to Westworld, this one seems to have been forgotten – rather unfairly, I feel, as the ideas are much more interesting.

Time After Time – maybe stretching the scf-fi theme but anyway... HG Wells (Malcolm McDowell) informs a group of friends that he has a time machine and he's leaving for the future. However, the gathering is interrupted by police, who have come to arrest one of his guests who is actually... Jack the Ripper! That guest (played by David Warner) uses the time machine to escape to modern day LA... horrified, Wells sets out to apprehend him.  That might not sound much cop, but it's a very charming film and the two leads are wonderful – one character alarmed to see that the future doesn't hold a utopian society and the other who fits right in.

The American Astronaut (2001)...

Good call – and Stingray Sam is worth a mention.

......Witch House may be modern, but my memory fails me....

The Masters of Horror one is.

I attend the Horror On Sea festival in Southend every year, a showcase for low-budget modern horror features. A highlight at this year's event was THE CALL GIRL OF CTHULHU. Every bit as good as its title.

That one was a Kickstarter one, wasn't it? Heard very mixed things about it but will get round to it sooner or later!
 

...The Brother From Another Planet is the story of an alien crash landing in Harlem pursued by two bounty hunters and the assumptions people make because of his black skin. A tiny budget but nicely shot and a really good central performance from Joe Morton....

Was going to mention that one!

...I did wonder if Smith & Jones' Morons From Outer Space might have improved with age but on a recent viewing it turned out to be just as dire as I remembered from when it came out.

That was one I liked (and had seen more than once) but didn't enjoy it years later – generally, I had remembered the best bits and my memory had made them better than they were. Would I watch it again? Absolutely.

[olliebean]

Time After Time – maybe stretching the scf-fi theme but anyway... HG Wells (Malcolm McDowell) informs a group of friends that he has a time machine and he's leaving for the future. However, the gathering is interrupted by police, who have come to arrest one of his guests who is actually... Jack the Ripper! That guest (played by David Warner) uses the time machine to escape to modern day LA... horrified, Wells sets out to apprehend him.  That might not sound much cop, but it's a very charming film and the two leads are wonderful – one character alarmed to see that the future doesn't hold a utopian society and the other who fits right in.

Currently being made into a TV series: http://io9.com/obscure-but-awesome-70s-time-travel-movie-inexplicably-1730758278

[BlodwynPig]

You've really got to wonder why Lovecraft hasn't been plundered more...maybe the idea of beings beyond imagination rules it out.

You've got this...In the Mouth of Madness (heavily inspired by anyway, maybe The Thing too)...Re-animator...that's about it.

Dagon, although it was a tenuous link. (the plot that is)

[Herbert Ashe]

A chance to vote for a personal favourite here, TOMORROW I'LL WAKE UP AND SCALD MYSELF WITH TEA, a late 1970s Czech time travel yarn screened by the Beeb one Sunday night in their wonderful 'Film International' slot.

Along very similar lines is I killed Einstein, Gentlemen. Someone intelligent could probably say some stuff now about post-1968 rewriting history or something.

Jindrich Polak who did Tomorrow... also did the somewhat better-known Czechoslovak sci-fi film Ikarie XB1.

[BlodwynPig]

A friend of mine saw that when it aired and didn't stop talking about it for ages, and over the last couple of decades it came up a lot as well. Finally managed to track down a copy a few months back and it is a really great film, but as far a nudity goes it's not sexy at all so I was obviously greatly disappointed!

The lesbian cave is when it comes alive. No nudity there. The underwater nudity stuff at the beginning, from what I recall, was the only scene with bare ladies? i only saw it once, when it aired as well. So memories are hazy.

[BlodwynPig]

From Beyond appeared on Netflix a couple of weeks ago.
The only other film that I think does a good job of Lovecraft is Stuart Gordon's Dagon, which is actually an adaptation of The Shadow Over Innsmouth.

Sorry, didn't see your post. I thought the plot was not that similar to Shadow - albeit with Deep Ones and Innsmouth. OK, maybe I am wrong.

[BlodwynPig]

You also have this classic:



Starring Quantum Leap Al.

[Gulftastic]

The lesbian cave is when it comes alive. No nudity there. The underwater nudity stuff at the beginning, from what I recall, was the only scene with bare ladies? i only saw it once, when it aired as well. So memories are hazy.
[/quoete]

get thee to YouTube! Its there under its original title. No subs, but who cares?

[Eis Nein]

As a segue back to the topic tut tut, Lifeforce, written by Dan O'Bannon and from memory chiefly a means of getting Mathilde May to strut around in the buff. In that sense a film as useful as Barbarella.

Another Space Girl features in A for Andromeda, a TV adaptation of a Fred Hoyle story, stars Tom Hardy.

[Ignatius_S]

You also have this classic...

This is a far better adaptation: https://archive.org/details/SuspenseDunwichHorrorWithRonaldColman110145

*edited* Admittedly, it's not a film but it's an interesting adaptation on a popular mainstream anthology series.

[Blumf]

As a segue back to the topic tut tut, Lifeforce, written by Dan O'Bannon and from memory chiefly a means of getting Mathilde May to strut around in the buff.

Similar theme with Bruce Campbell not wondering around in the nip:

Moontrap (1989)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097911/

And, in turn, similar to that (but not Lifeforce):

Virus (1999)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120458/

[GeeWhiz]

Skeletons is a lovely wee Brit sci-fi indie, usually available in Fopp for around a fiver. Two bickering salesmen traipse around the English countryside, offering 'the process' to families who want to expunge the, er, skeletons from their respective memory closets. The Guardian called it 'Inception on the dole'. I rather loved it.

[billtheburger]

For British Science Fiction, I'd suggest Xtro.

[BlodwynPig]

Castle Freak
The Dunwich Horror
The Call Of Cthulhu
Dreams In The Witch House
Dagon, as I mentioned above.
Necronomicon.
...

There have been loads, but they're nearly all dreadful.

A film of Dreams in the Witch House...not one of those fanclub movies? For me, its the most terrifying of his stories

and Brown Jenkin

[Small Man Big Horse]

The lesbian cave is when it comes alive. No nudity there. The underwater nudity stuff at the beginning, from what I recall, was the only scene with bare ladies? i only saw it once, when it aired as well. So memories are hazy.

There's occasional random nudity for most of the first half of the movie, iirc, and whilst fun I can't remember the cave sequence being that sexy, but that might be because I'm not in to caves, lesbian or not.

[Steven]

There have been loads, but they're nearly all dreadful.

Yep, I went through a spell of watching Lovecraft adaptations a few years ago when Del Toro's adaptation of At The Mountains Of Madness was announced, which sounded like it could work as I like his ability to draw his own gnarled creations and realise them on the screen, enough to catch the eye but with enough left to the imagination. Really pissed me off he was put off by the similar plot of Scott's shit pile Prometheus, what a waste.

There's something dark and compelling about Lovecraft's writing...sterile and austere yet quite mind expanding to read.

This is why it's bad for movies I think, the darkness lurking underneath is only ever implied, as it is an ineffable darkness that resides at the core of the human soul. The night, the unknown, the unexplored, desolate winds moan through a black eternity as your mind scrambles mountains built from primordial fears of what nameless horrors endure. It's an innate terror of the unknown that resides in us all, for practicality purposes as we are not night hunters and at our most vulnerable in the dark of night when the nocturnal carnivores come out with their fangs bared, no wonder children conjure up monsters in the safety of their bedrooms, it's a communal alarm system built in to us for mutual protection. The problem is Lovecraft's universe is built on several layers of these primeval fears going back worlds, eons, dimensions, you can't really demonstrate a hinterland pantheon of ancient deity on the screen you can only really imply it, and aside from some clever CGI you can maybe briefly show something scary, a monster, but once that's done with you've shot your wad and you've removed that looming angst that's all the more effective in the form of literature where it has time to really sink in.

[Hollow]

The Nameless City, that's the short story I read first, a bit by accident...never read anything like it...I've only got a few left to read now and I've deliberately left them so I don't complete his oeuvre in it's entirety...like pushing bits of the best meal you've ever had round your plate to make it last longer.

[Famous Mortimer]

For British Science Fiction, I'd suggest Xtro.

It's a bit ropey, but I like it - even though Xtro 2 is unbearable dogshit and Xtro 3 is no great shakes either. I do like how the director kept the rights to the name but not the story, which is why the sequels have no relation whatsoever to the first movie (or each other). He did a really honest interview about them:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovp-z9O56IE

[Paaaaul]

A film of Dreams in the Witch House...not one of those fanclub movies? For me, its the most terrifying of his stories

and Brown Jenkin

It was an hour long film made by Stuart Gordon for the Masters Of Horror series. Not recommended.

[Steven]

Skeletons is a lovely wee Brit sci-fi indie, usually available in Fopp for around a fiver. Two bickering salesmen traipse around the English countryside, offering 'the process' to families who want to expunge the, er, skeletons from their respective memory closets. The Guardian called it 'Inception on the dole'. I rather loved it.

Thanks for recommending this, tell the truth on this first watch I didn't really enjoy it, though it's definitely a strange film and I couldn't possibly imagine the mind that conjured it up, which is good I suppose, no idea where it was going. And yeah, Lord Lucan def looks like Freddie Mercury.

[biggytitbo]

Future world is good because it has the earliest use of CGI and you also see a willy in it.

[biggytitbo]