HALLOWEEN HORROR: The Seed (2021)

Three old friends - vapid online influencer Deidre (Lucy Martin from Vikings), pet shop worker Charlotte (I Hate Suzie's Chelsea Edge), and Heather (Sophie Vavasseur, Resident Evil: Apocalypse) - head for chilled weekend at an isolated luxury villa in the Mojave desert.

The idea being they will spend the time catching-up, drinking, taking drugs and watching a "once-in-a-lifetime" meteor shower.

However, an unexpected side effect of the meteor shower is the arrival of a strange creature, dropping out the sky into the villa's swimming pool.

Thinking it's possibly an armadillo or a bear cub, Charlotte wants to care for it, but the others are less keen and just want rid of the bizarre, stinking object.

However, as the weekend unfolds, the new arrival begins to have a strange effect on first Deidre and then Heather, before Charlotte (the obvious Final Girl from the moment she appears on screen) realises what is going on.

The first feature-length work from writer-director Sam Walker, The Seed is an engrossing - if not totally original - spin on an anti-E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial meets Color Out Of Space story.

On a superficial level, this is a 1950s shlock horror movie of the "aliens-want-our-women" sub-genre, updated for the contemporary social media generation. 

I was really expecting to find the leads annoying, but even the over-the-top Deidre is hypnotically watchable because of Lucy Martin's stellar performance.

Throw in some surreal Society-style shunting; psychedelic mental communications; and gallons of black, alien, blood and you have a great recipe for an enjoyable 90-minute Lovecraftian body horror romp.

The alien creature itself is fascinating as it is largely passive, but, as long as you can suspend your disbelief, this puppet-from-another-planet is a compelling antagonist since it relies primarily on mental powers - rather than physical - to get what it wants.

The script isn't perfect though. While Charlotte and Deidre are well-developed characters, Heather seems oddly lacking any sort of backstory beyond the fact that her father owns the villa and she's constantly worried about messing it up.

And when Charlotte and Heather are exploring the seemingly-abandoned cabin of their nearest neighbour, there's a definite suggestion that something apocalyptic has happened to the rest of the world already, and yet later we learn this is not the case.

Conversely, through the clever use of clairvoyant montages, The Seed does an excellent job of foreshadowing the alien invader's plans for the Earth without anyone spoon-feeding them to the audience.

Sam Walker also clearly loves his fake-out endings, which I always approve of if done well and these are.

HALLOWEEN HORROR: Color Out Of Space (2019)

Nathan Gardner (Nic Cage) and his wife, Theresa (Joely Richardson), have moved, with their three children, out of the big city to a secluded farm in the woods outside Arkham, Massachusetts, for a bit of peace and quiet.

Stockbroker Theresa is recovering from cancer and Nathan is trying his hand at becoming a self-sufficient farmer.

However their lives are disrupted when a strange meteorite crashes on their land, polluting the area with a paranormal alien radiation.

HP Lovecraft's original story of The Colour Out Of Space has been adapted many times, but, beyond a shadow of a doubt the latest iteration, from writer/director Richard Stanely, is the most Lovecraftian.

A gorgeous, mind-bending, blend of the cosmic with the body horror of The Thing and Society,  Color Out Of Space focuses on a trapped - and doomed - family, slowly worn down by an unknowable, extraterrestrial invader.

Certainly not for everyone, Color Out Of Space isn't a trashy teen slasher flick with obvious heroes and villains, but a terrifying encapsulation of the central theme of Lovecraft's oeuvre that "common human laws and interests and emotions have no validity or significance in the vast cosmos-at-large".

There is never really any serious suggestion that the alien entity is even aware of the humans it is transforming by its simple presence.

My Copy - Not Used In Any Rituals!

The film bears obvious similarities with 2018's Annihilation, but Color Out Of Space is the stronger work of art by a country mile.

Across the board, the central performances are superb. Nic Cage channels Nic Cage as only he can, exhibiting the convincing levels of madness and sudden rage that he does so well, while The Magicians' Madeleine Arthur is impressive as teen daughter, Lavinia, whose rebellious nature expresses itself through dabbling in witchcraft.

Beyond the gooey body horror, there's some cringe-inducing - but thankfully brief - self-mutilation that might require some eye-covering by those of us with a particular aversion to such things.

As well as rooting the story squarely in Lovecraft country, Richard Stanley has sown his tale with Lovecraftian Easter Eggs, such as the Miskatonic University sweat shirt worn by visiting surveyor Ward (Elliot Knight, sadly no relation) and the tatty, cheap paperback copy - "by Simon" - of the Necronomicon (which we all own) that Lavina consults.

Quite possibly my favourite film of 2020, Color Out Of Space is breathtaking in the audacity of its vision, a modern rendition of a Lovecraft story that truly captures the horror of its set-up and the terror of those trapped within its incidental and inescapable prison.

Annihilation (2018)

Three years ago, something alien crash landed in an isolated, swampy, region of southern America, creating an expanding field of energy known as The Shimmer.

While the government has been able to keep this classified so far, every expedition sent inside to investigate has failed to return.

That is, until special forces operative Kane (Oscar Isaac), the husband of biologist Lena (Natalie Portman), suddenly appears back at their house.

He is unable to tell her anything about where he has been, and quickly falls ill.

As they are being rushed to hospital, the government swoops in and Lena and her dying husband are taken to the Southern Reach, a top secret scientific outpost monitoring the growth of The Shimmer.

In an effort to help save her husband - and understand what happened to him - Lena agrees to accompany a new team venturing into the strange phenomenon.

As they enter, they quickly begin to grasp the extent of the mutative effects of the alien field, not just on the landscape and wildlife, but on themselves.

Released on Netflix today, Annihilation deserves a place amongst the rarefied Lovecraftian horrors of In The Mouth Of Madness, Event Horizon, The Thing et al that encapsulate the style and feel of HP Lovecraft's work without actually being based directly on anything he wrote.

That said, in part, it feels like an updated spin on the Lovecraft classic Colour Out Of Space, with a side order of 2001: A Space Odyssey for flavouring.

Written and directed by Alex Garland - adapted from the first volume of Jeff VanderMeer's critically-acclaimed Southern Reach Trilogy - Annihilation initially unfolds beautifully, dazzling with its blend of disorientating sci-fi and atmospheric horror.

From the get-go, it's obvious that this is not a horror film for everyone, it's a slow burn, not relying on jump scares, but rather on the audience imagining themselves in that predicament, as everything they think is true begins to unravel.

However, where the film disappoints is its climactic "kill it with fire" resolution to the unearthly situation, rather than anything more cerebral as one might have hoped after the build-up.

Although blurred - and missing - time is a factor within The Shimmer, towards the climax of Annihilation it's clear that the story has a pacing issue.

While it may not have been able to attract the big name stars, I came away from this eagerly-anticipated film thinking that it would have worked better as, say, a six-part mini-series.

That way we could have been drawn in to, and experienced, the strange goings-on of The Shimmer on a deeper level.

So, while I say it deserves to be counted amongst those other legendary Lovecraftian horror movies, Annihilation is sadly the 'also ran' of the group.

It feels as though Garland couldn't decide whether to go full gonzo - as the set-up deserves - or play it safe with a more commercial horror flick, and in the end settled on something that was a bit of both and a lot of neither.

Glorious (2022)

After breaking up with his seemingly perfect girlfriend, a broken-hearted man, Wes (True Blood's Ryan Kwanten) is driving across country and realises he needs to stop before tiredness causes him to have an accident.

Pulling into a remote woodland, roadside, rest stop, he rages, drinks, destroys mementos from his past, and eventually finds himself locked inside the isolated bathroom.

Just to make his problems worse, there's a voice coming from the other toilet stall that claims to be an elder demigod, Ghat (voiced by JK Simmons), who needs a favour from Wes to prevent his father, an all-powerful cosmic creator god, from annihilating mankind.

Despite moments of broad dark comedy, Glorious is an incredibly tight piece of cosmic horror, tapping into Lovecraftian tropes by way of Michael Shea.

Penned by Joshua Hull, David Ian McKendry, and Todd Rigney, and directed by Rebekah McKendry, who has also directed the Elevator Game, Glorious is a delightfully grotty, unnerving, creepy horror that plays with expectations and makes great use of its limited cast and single main location.

The film is very self-contained and claustrophobic, for the most part a two-hander between Kwanten and Simmons' voice, with occasional appearances from the memory of Wes's girlfriend, Brenda (Sylvia Grace Crim), that could almost be a stage play if not for the moments of over the top special effects and gore.

It's certainly one of the best attempts I've seen to modernise the spirit of Lovecraft, putting it on a par with The Void, mixed with elements of Color Out Of Space and Evil Dead, and within touching distance of John Carpenter's In The Mouth of Madness.

The pared-to-the-bone presentation means you can't really discuss much about the plot of Glorious without lurching headlong into verboten spoiler territory, but if you've read many of my reviews and think our tastes might gel then you'll probably love Glorious as much as I did.

Breadcrumbs leading to personal revelations about Wes are sown throughout the script, so you need to pay attention not just to what is being said, but the context.

While some of the sexual allusions might not have sat well with old starchy-pants Howard Phillips Lovecraft I reckon he would have liked the story of Glorious anyway for its combination of grim horror and wit.

I can understand why some might be underwhelmed, or even disappointed, by the ending but for me it was narratively and emotionally perfect, emulating the bleak spirit of many Lovecraftian horror tales.

The Beach House (2019)

In an attempt to patch up their relationship, opinionated, deadbeat, college dropout - and runner-up in a Skeet Ulrich-lookalike competition - Randall (Noah Le Gros) takes his supersmart girlfriend, Emily (Liana Liberato) to his family's beach house.

As it's out of season, they're expecting to have the place to themselves.

However, due to a breakdown in communication with Randall's dad, they instead find a couple of old family friends - Mitch (Hell on Wheels and Dawn of The Dead's Jake Weber) and his sick wife, Jane (Maryann Nagel) - are already staying there.

As the house is big enough to accommodate everyone, after a few awkward moments, they agree to "get to know you" meal that, having exhausted the alcohol supply, ends with the consumption of some edible marijuana.

Senses heightened by the drugs everyone is awed by a blue luminesce that clings to everything around the beach.

And the next morning, things start to get even weirder as people start to feel violently ill.

Having witnessed an apparent suicide, Emily - the only real candidate for the title of 'final girl' - stumbles across something vile and gelatinous on the beach, and soon finds herself trying to escape an unnatural fog that's rolling in as well.

For all intents and purposes, The Beach House is another reimagining of HP Lovecraft's Color Out Of Space, only this time the alien infestation is coming from the bottom of the ocean, rather than the cold depths of the cosmos.

Mixed in for good measure is a flavouring of Stephen King's The Mist and John Carpenter's The Fog, and maybe a soupçon of Quatermass.

There's no denying that all the ingredients are there for a quality horror film, and it was trailers for The Beach House that originally got me thinking about subscribing to the Shudder streaming service.

If you're coming to this cold, you should be aware that it's a really slow burn. Pretty much nothing  really happens for the first half of this 88-minute movie, except Mitch and Jane being a bit odd.

But then, suddenly, the body horror cranks up and we're off to the races.

There are some deliciously gross-out moments around this time when you can't help wondering if this is going to be "the greatest film of all time", but sadly it isn't.

Like Emily herself, the plot stumbles all over the place, trying to figure out what's going on.

Having a lead character's obscure area of study - and interests - corollate almost exactly with the nature of the random, apocalyptic, scenario  that she has fallen into is rather heavy-handed, even if Emily doesn't really call upon her area of expertise once everything starts to hit the fan. 

Instead, it is simply sown in as ominous exposition during the meal with Mitch and Jane, and like a lot of the set-up is more or less a red herring. 

That said, I have no problems with stories - horror ones, in particular - where the audience isn't spoon-fed an explanation of what's occurring (if nothing else, it helps you sympathise with the struggles of the central characters), but I'm not sure writer/director Jeffrey A Brown's script gave us as much information as he thought it did.

But, perhaps, my biggest bugbear - which kept pulling me out of the moment - was the total absence of mobile phones.

There was no indication that The Beach House was a 'period piece', but nobody had a mobile phone (which, of course, would have been very useful and would have almost certainly changed the direction of the story). Nobody even mentioned the idea of finding one.

Communication-wise, all we saw were a couple of disconnected landlines and a CB radio.

Where were the mobile phones? I'm annoyed at myself over how much this bugged me, but mobiles are ubiquitous in modern society and their absence was as big a mystery as what was actually causing the water-borne infection.