IMDb
In Louisiana, the thirty-five year old single mother Lavina delivers a baby boy and a monster in the evil Whateley House. Ten years later, Dr. Henry Armitage and his assistant Professor Fay Morgan discover that the page 751 of every copy of the Necronomicon is missing and The Black Brotherhood has summoned the gate keeper Yog Sothoth to leave the portal opened to the demons and ancient gods. They invite the arrogant and skeptical Professor Walter Rice that can translate the Necronomicon to help them to seek the book. Meanwhile Lavina's son Wilbur Whateley ages very fast and seeks the missing page to open the portal.
- Written by Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
HorrorNews
SYNOPSIS:
An adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s works, “Dunwich Horror” tells the story of Wilbur Whateley (Jeffery Combs of Re-Animator, The Frighteners) and his sinister quest to procure a copy of the Necronomicon, an ancient, diabolical manuscript that will help him open a doorway to a dimension inhabited by unspeakable creatures known as the ‘Old Ones.’ Driven by his sorcerous uncle and a creature of the darkest evil in their farmhouse, Wilbur meets opposition from Dr. Henry Armitage (Golden Globe winner Dean Stockwell of Quantum Leap, Battlestar Gallactica) and his team of historians sworn to protect the book. The book’s guardians race against time through mysterious worlds in search for the elusive page containing the incan’tations to open the portal, but Whateley’s success forces Armitage and his team to battle the malevolent creature Yog-Sothoth and close the portal or allow mankind to suffer its ultimate doom.
REVIEW:
The Dunwich Horror was, originally, a short story written by the great author of weird fiction, H. P. Lovecraft. During his life, Lovecraft struggled with many financial issues while trying to sell his fiction. He had a small cult following of fans, many of which included fellow authors who wrote stories that were based on his fiction, these type of stories were later to become known as ‘The Cthulu Mythos.’ Sadly, just like Edgar Allen Poe, Lovecraft’s popularity dramatically increased only after his death. The Cthulu Mythos have been expanding ever since: there have been several new stories added into the mythos, (including one by Stephen King, titled Jerusalem’s Lot), several paper and pencil role playing and video games have been based on his stories and obviously there have been several feature films that bore H. P. Lovecraft’s name over the title. Leigh Scott’s The Dunwich Horror is one such film.
The film opens with a scene involving Lavina (Lauren Michele) giving birth to twins. One is born normal, while the second one’s birth invokes screams of terrors from the midwife (Victoria Patenaude). We then to go to what seems like, a routine exorcism. Father Hoadley (Richard Zeringue) emerges from a room, clearly feeling defeated from the ritual. His assistant, Father Endalade (Marcus Lyle Brown) offers to help, but is quickly warned against it by the elderly priest. Dr. Henry Armitage (Dean Stockwell) and Professor Fay Morgan (Sarah Lieving) enter and quickly take over the situation.
Their exorcism goes relatively well and they discover a ritual pyramid under the floor boards of the possessed girl’s room. The pyramid bore a strong resemblance to the Lament Configuration in Clive Barker’s Hellraiser. The pair eventually find out that the girl, Caitlin’s (Natacha Itzel) possession was a result of an open portal between our world and a world occupied by ancient gods called, “The Old Ones.” To close the gate, they must find The Necronomicon (The Book of the Dead), or rather, page 175 of it, since all the available translations are all missing that page. To help find it, they enlist the help of a fellow university professor, Walter Rice (Griff Furst.)
Simultaneously, the Wheatly family are also looking for The Necronomicon’s missing page. Wilbur Wheatly (Jeffery Combs) is one of the twins that were born at the beginning of the film. His brother, Yog-Sothoth, is a creature whose needs to be fed regularly, so he can grow large enough to be able to hold open the gate for The Old Ones to gain entry into our world. Can you guess what’s on the menu for little ol’ Yog-Sothoth?
A lot of the acting in this film comes off a little wooden and forced, although it doesn’t hinder the film too much, to a certain degree, the acting could have been a little better. I expect a better performance from Dean Stockwell, who I remember portrayed Sam on Quantum Leap and did a very well.
This film shines in its storyline, which is really what kept me interested throughout its runtime. I can’t say that I have actively pursued the numerous film adaptations of Lovecraft’s work, but I have seen a few and this movie ranks among the best of them. I appreciated the cameos of some of Lovecraft’s key characters, like, Charles Dexter Ward and The Mad Arab, Alhazred who is the original author of The Necronomicon.
The dialogue was also pretty solid, except for the very end of the film, where some of the lines come off as painfully corny. I recommend this film to fans of Lovecraft’s fiction. Even though Leigh Scott took some major liberties with the source material, the film still did very well with capturing the feel of the stories. Just don’t expect anything too off the charts or groundbreaking. The Dunwich Horror is a welcome addition to the library of Lovecraft cinema, and a pretty solid horror film in its own right, too.
BY SILVIA MORENO-GARCIA
The problem with Lovecraft is that it’s hard to maintain the suspense of his stories on screen. A lot of his work was thin on plot and thick on atmosphere, which means filling two hours worth of entertainment involves a lot of padding.The Dunwich Horror is one of his longer and more easily adaptable stories because of its length and plot.
That didn’t stop the makers of this new adaptation of Dunwich from producing a bizarre bit of filmmaking. And it’s not Cronenberg bizarre. It’s more “Why does the director keep using cross-fades to create a nonexistent sense of menace?”
The first odd thing about the newest Dunwich is that it gives away the ending in the first few minutes of the film, then explains it again in case the audience didn’t get it. If you haven’t read Lovecraft’s story, I’m not going to spoil it for you, but suffice it to say that the punchline of the whole story is dangled before our eyes early on, using some bad special effects.
The second odd occurrence is the appearance of Dean Stockwell (who was in the first adaptation of Dunwich, together with Sandra Dee) as an exorcist who shoots lightning bolts out of his hands, kind of like Julian Sands did back in Warlock or Palpatine in The Return of the Jedi. Only, this film was made recently and the cheesy lightning looks dated.
In fact, the whole movie looks a bit dated. I don’t know if it was the photography or the wardrobe or the soundtrack, but it gave me a big case of déjà vu, as though half a dozen semi-forgotten B-horror movies collided to make this a whole.
Anyway, Dean Stockwell is Dr. Armitage, a good guy intent on stopping the Old Ones from entering our world and gobbling it up. He enlists the aid of Griff Furst and Sarah Lieving to retrieve a copy of the Necronomicon before the evil Jeffrey Combs can get his hands on it.
We know Combs and his family are evil because they look like they wandered off the set of Deliverance. Ah, yes, the evil hillbillies. Stereotypes are yummy! Feed them to Cthulhu! Which brings me to one of my biggest gripes against the movie: why is it set in Alabama? I’ve got nothing against changing the locale of a story. But dragging cast and crew all the way to Alabama and never mining the location for all it’s worth is ridiculous. I’m sure a swamp at dusk can look very creepy, but you wouldn’t know it from this movie. Thus, the potential for a bit of Southern Gothic goes right out the window, along with the plot.
There’s a boring quest for the Necronomicon, but it’s all painful to watch, with too many missed chances. For example, when the reclusive Olaus Wormius enters the scene, he turns out to be a disappointing, chubby guy whose biggest mojo consists of clumsily levitating into the room.
Characters say things like: Hey, look, that’s “a Sumerian ritual pyramid, 5ooo years old.” But there’s no awe in the story, the exposition, or the character interactions. Dean Stockwell and Jeffrey Combs do their best under the circumstances, but can’t lift the whole movie on their own. The lack of zest is what eventually kills The Dunwich Horror.
The best part of this adaptation is the reference to Mythos characters and places. It’s cute, but not enough to make me recommend a movie that misses so many marks and ultimately concludes with an evil, purple cloud as the scary monster of the picture. Purple is only terrifying when you’re wearing it.
Yes, I realize this is a low-budget flick set to premiere on the SyFy Channel this fall. Nevertheless, the movie’s low budget is not a good excuse for its lack of thrills. A low-budget movie can be creepy. Otherwise, Val Lewton wouldn’t have made a name for himself back in the day and Romero wouldn’t have launched a career with Night of the Living Dead.
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