Col­or Out of Space

There’s an inher­ent prob­lem in try­ing to adapt the writ­ing of HP Love­craft. The very notion of some­thing being ​‘Love­craft­ian’ con­notes some­thing that can­not be envi­sioned, that can­not be under­stood by the human eye. Richard Stanley’s adap­ta­tion of the short sto­ry ​‘Col­or Out of Space’ – his first fea­ture in over a decade – deft­ly side­steps the cus­tom­ary road­block that comes with Love­craft adaptations.

Instead of try­ing to over­come the con­tra­dic­tion of por­tray­ing some­thing incom­pre­hen­si­ble, Stan­ley focus­es in on the mad­ness induced by bear­ing wit­ness to an unholy cos­mic ter­ror. He observes a fam­i­ly attempt­ing to find rea­son, or com­fort one anoth­er, through mean­ing­less platitudes.

The film relo­cates the sto­ry to the present day, chart­ing the unspeak­able hor­rors that befall the Gard­ner fam­i­ly after a mete­orite crash­es and sinks into the earth, its radi­a­tion trans­form­ing every­thing it makes con­tact with. The script is dis­arm­ing­ly fun­ny, even as the mem­bers of this quirky fam­i­ly are besieged on all sides by an alien men­ace, start­ing as arche­types that soon break down – in the lit­er­al sense too, as human flesh is twist­ed into new and hor­ri­fy­ing forms. It’s an often bewil­der­ing mix­ture of tones, and becomes increas­ing­ly strange as the film goes on.

After a while, how­ev­er, it leans too hard into the com­e­dy, as the quips soon start to feel at odds with the Cro­nen­berg/Thing-like shapeshift­ing mon­sters which inex­plic­a­bly emerge and destroy the fam­i­ly. The film’s schtick begins to wear thin as it becomes increas­ing­ly quip­py and in turn more of a slog. But, for the most part, it’s a hard film to pre­dict, as con­ven­tion­al hero­ics appear ulti­mate­ly use­less in the face of an all-encom­pass­ing force that the human mind is unable to com­pre­hend – caught only in glimpses of spec­tac­u­lar, extrater­res­tri­al vistas.

Nico­las Cage’s per­for­mance as Gard­ner patri­arch Nathan stands out, though per­haps not always for the bet­ter. His char­ac­ter is an atyp­i­cal­ly soft father fig­ure who either speaks in catch­phras­es, such as ​“a dream you share is a real­i­ty,” or yells about the val­ue of alpacas. This veneer gives way as he is con­sumed by mad­ness, cru­el­ly insult­ing and snip­ing at the fam­i­ly he usu­al­ly treats with extreme gen­tle­ness. Cage’s increas­ing­ly man­ic per­for­mance feels tied to his turn in Panos Cos­matos’ Mandy, in that we bear wit­ness to a house­bro­ken Cage descend­ing into an ani­mal­is­tic, blood­thirsty fren­zy – but it lacks the focus and emo­tion­al pow­er of that pre­vi­ous role.

Even before this point, the film’s visu­als are gor­geous. The rur­al New Eng­land land­scape is paint­ed with bold, sump­tu­ous colours. Splashy, drugged-out pur­ples fill the sky, and the grass seems to become green­er in response. As for the afore­men­tioned mon­sters, Stan­ley tru­ly stretch­es the bud­get to break­ing point with inven­tive, dis­turb­ing imagery of bod­ies mutat­ing, trans­form­ing and melt­ing togeth­er. Col­in Stetson’s trip­py sound­track tips the film even fur­ther into delir­i­um, and the impres­sive craft offers up a world that’s dis­con­cert­ing to behold, even if the time spent in it feels a lit­tle stretched.