HPL Film Fest round up

Even the venue was creepy for the HP Lovecraft Film Festival in Portland, Oregon this past weekend. Carol and I had a blast seeing many shorts and features all based (some more loosely than others) on Lovecraft’s work.

The theatres were packed for all the shorts and features. The ultra-dark Lovecraft inspired artwork showing between films was interesting. It’s fascinating to see one artist’s take on another’s work. Lovecraft does seem to inspire a lot of folks.

Andrew Migliore, founder of the festival and owner of Lurker Films, was our enthusiastic host. Thanks for all your hard work Andrew.

Stuart Gordon, director of Re-Animator (his take on the tale of the twisted Dr Herbert West from Lovecraft’s writing) was there all weekend and did two q & a sessions follwing the showing and world premiere of his installment in the Masters of Horror series “Dreams In the Witch-House”. His film was hands down the best one at the festival for me (and the most commercially viable). He took some shocking risks that will definitely disturb viewers if the scenes even make it past censors. If this episode is indicative of the type of horror we can expect from the Masters series we’re really in for a treat.

There were many merchants peddling their HP-esque wares in the upstairs theatre lobby. Carol and I snagged some t-shirts, The H.P. Lovecraft Collection Volume 3: Out of Mind on DVD (the star Christopher Heyerdahl, a Vancouver actor, gave a brilliant reading of one of Lovecraft’s works on Friday night) and The Re-Animator on CD as read by Jeffrey Combs, Dr Herbert West from Gordon’s Re-Animator.

All in all a fun weekend. Cthulhu Lives!

More on H.P. Lovecraft.