Necronomicon (1993)

Usually I don't like movies that have three stories with a wrapper around them but here it works fine. The first story is pretty good, the second is pretty dull and the last is awesome. The wraparound is one of the best in this type of movie. The first story was good with a great amount of creepy monster effects and scary moments. The second story left me cold. The third story was great with like demons and stuff. The wraparound would have been better as a separate story but it is very entertaining with a great ending (just like the first and third stories). Four stories in one film and three of them are great! This is a gritty classic.

Good props, good music, good scenery, good lighting and competent actors with Jeffrey Combs at the helm of the wrap around make this movie worth watching. The main plot is kept delightfully simple - H.P. Lovecraft goes to a monastery library to catch a forbidden glimpse of the Necronomicon. He steals the key to a gated chamber where he finds a safe containing the Necronomicon; setting off a mysterious mechanism that apparently locks him inside. He then sits at the table; flip open his writing tablet and rather than copying pages, he proceeds to write three stories inspired by the fishy effervescence of alien magic contained therein.That's when things get weirder than they already are. Not for the character, but for the viewer. The average viewer is not nearly familiar enough with Lovecraft's writings to understand how he portrayed the traditional family unit, and therefore how to understand what the movie producers were trying to translate onto film. Family and procreation in Lovecraft stories were at best only relevant in terms of interbreeding with aliens (shadow over innsmouth); at worse a social mechanism that has the capacity to de-evolve humans into violent primates (lurking fear). Lovecraft made no bones about it - the family that stays together, gets strange together.Without a lens of literary context to see this movie through, it's no wonder that it ultimately translates into an anti-abortion message. You have one character that is a perpetually pregnant woman; and another character that is bargaining to continue her pregnancy to save her own life. Perhaps the producers of this movie should have considered how these elements would affect the female half of the audience rather than just hoping everyone would "get it."With that said, I have no reason to believe that there is an anti- abortion message in this movie; particularly since the first story burns a Bible early on. If that doesn't establish where this movie stands in terms of religious values, I'm not sure what will. Also, a horror movie is probably the worst place to try to send an anti-abortion message; and certainly not from aliens that drink human bone marrow like a milkshake.I wanted to give this a 10 out of 10, as they did a great job with what they had to work with. However, since literary context is necessary, I am taking it down a notch since I have to, once again, encourage people to read Lovecraft to understand what's going on. For me, the ideal Lovecraft movie would not only accurately express his literary vision; but in such a way that the mainstream audience can understand it too.

Necronomicon starts in 1932 as writer H.P. Lovecraft (Jeffrey Combs) as learned that an order of Ontraggi Monks guard a copy of the legendary occult book the Necronomicon, Lovecraft manages to locate the vault where the Necronomicon is hidden & begins the read it...First he reads about 'The Drowned' in which a man named Edward De Lapoer (Bruce Payne) inherits an old hotel that has been abandoned for sixty years after the suicide of his ancestor Jethro De Lapoer (Richard Lynch) managed to bring his dead wife & son back to life using spells from the Necronomicon...The next story 'The Cold' is about newspaper reporter Dale Porkel (Dennis Christopher) who investigates the murder of several people which leads him to a boarding house & a certain Dr. Madden (David Warner) who has managed to prolong his life but with dire consequences...Finally Lovecraft reads 'The Whispers' about a female cop named Sarah (Signy Coleman) descent under an old warehouse where she finds herself in an ancient temple full of Bat creatures who feast on human flesh & need human brains to breed...This French & American co-production is a three part horror anthology film based around three short stories by H.P. Lovecraft who also features in the fictional wraparound segment, the wraparound segment & the third story 'The Whispers' was directed by Brian Yuzna while the first story 'The Drowned' was directed by the French born Christophe Gans while the second story was directed by the Japanese born Shûsuke Kaneko. The script for Necronomicon uses various Lovecraft themes & ideas but the individual stories don't really represent their supposed source materials but I still found them all enjoyable in different ways. I think it's quite nice to watch a horror film that has no annoying teenagers in it, that isn't a remake of anything & isn't a typically predictable slasher & to that end I did enjoy this although it could have been better. Each of the stories has an air of the supernatural about it with the first in particular, each story features the Necronomicon somehow but I would say that 'The Cold' is maybe the best of the three with 'Whispers' not far behind it & while 'The Drowned' is far from bad it's probably the least of the three stories. There's certainly plenty of gore & monsters here & the effects men have a blast bringing all sorts of slimy monsters, people melting, severed limbs & splattery creations to life. At a little over 90 minutes each story lasts the 25 minute range & are all suitably different although I think the twist endings could have been a bitter & played more for dramatic impact.Although based on short stories by Lovecraft the adaptations retain little of their literally source, 'The Drowned' is an adaptation of The Rats in the Wall from 1924 only retains the De Lapoer name & something under a house (a city rather than a monster though), 'The Cold' is adapted from Cool Air published in 1931 & is the closest to the original story while 'Whispers' is adapted from The Whispers in Darkness from 1928 that deals with rumours of aliens hiding in the hills of Vermont rather than cops & old warehouses. Fans of other Yuzna produced Lovecraft adaptations such as Re-Animator (1985) & From Beyond (1986) will be happy to see the same sort of visual style & the same sort of gory special effects, from people melting to piles of severed limbs to people's faces being pulled off to people with the backs of their heads missing to some bat like alien monsters to a huge tentacled monster thing & more besides as the effects men throw plenty of blood & slime our way. The dark Gothic setting or 'The Drowned' is very nice & atmospheric while the more sedate setting of 'The Cold' works too but the somewhat surreal setting of 'Whispers' looks a little theatrical with it's bright neon lighting & smoke everywhere.With a supposed budget of about $4,000,000 this appears to have had some money spent on it & while the effects & sets probably cost a fair bit the stories do feel a little empty at times, Necronomicon feels like a showcase for the effects men rather than the talents of Lovecraft. The acting is pretty good, Jeffrey Combs, Bruce Payne, Richard Lynch & David Warner add a little marquee value for genre fans.Necronomicon is a good film, it's not a perfect film but at least it's something different from the teen slashers, remakes & giant Shark creature features that litter video shop shelves, I suppose it's an acquired taste & the stories might have been fleshed out more for dramatic purposes but it looks great, has lots of slime & gore & is well worth a watch.

I see others lambasting this movie, but can't agree - so I need to weigh in on the side of reason.While this is certainly not a must-see timeless classic, it's a competently-executed B movie with reasonably good special effects and a few faces who have been seen in bigger and better things. The style of the movie is similar to "Creepshow"; i.e. several small, unconnected stories told with a wraparound that sort of takes the place of a narrator. Imagine three episodes of "Tales from the Crypt" spliced together and you've got a good idea of the way the film is structured.All of the film versions of Lovecraft's works - and yes, I HAVE seen all of them in existence, as far as I know - were B movies, and the quality of this particular one is towards the upper middle of the pile. Yes, there are rubber monsters. However, they are quite well done for the era and budget that spawned this movie.If you want to see an example of a Lovecraft film adaptation I think is at the top of the quality scale, see Dagon. But don't shun this movie either; if you're a Lovecraft fan, this oeuvre is not to be despised.