Color Out of Space (2020)

Review

111min

Genre:       Comedy, Horror, Sci-fi

Director:     Richard Stanley

Cast:         Nicolas Cage, Joely Richardson, Madeleine Arthur…and more

Writers:     Richard Stanley, Scarlett Amaris and H.P. Lovecraft

-Synopsis-

Things get weird in small town rural America when a meteorite strikes the Gardner farm, as their behaviour becomes increasingly bizarre and the lines of reality are blurred by a powerful pinkish hue when the space rock begins to seep into everything, with ominous consequences for the whole family . . . and beyond.

It’s a rare occasion when Richard Stanley manages to marry his taste for the bizarre and macabre with his unfettered vision and manages to complete a film, having failed to deliver a full feature for nearly twenty-five years, and making his name thanks to the many unmade projects he developed as much as the few which actually reached the silver screen. But now the South African writer/director and cult favourite finds a soulmate and cinematic inspiration in the work of troubled American author and hugely influential horror pioneer H.P. Lovecraft. Becoming the latest filmmaker to adapt the Rhode Island writer’s 1927 short story into a modern but faithful take on a tale of alien infection and a descent into madness—delivering a darkly comical and psychedelic cinematic trip which makes good use of its singular larger-than-life star.

Nicolas Cage stars as rural New England hobby farmer and family man ‘Nathan Gardner’, relocated from the city with his wife ‘Theresa’ (Joely Richardson) after her cancer recovery, along with their rebellious pagan teenage daughter ‘Lavinia’ (Madeleine Arthur) and her younger brothers ‘Benny’ (Brendan Meyer) and ‘Jack’ (Julian Hilliard)—trying to grow tomatoes and raise alpacas while living the quiet life, which proves more stressful than it should be. But things take a surreal and cosmically hellish turn when a meteor lands on their doorstep, as its curious properties begin to infect the land and its people, shading everything in a shade of pink which changes the family’s behaviour and their very sense of reality, plunging the Garners into a struggle for survival against this new arrival from the cosmos which quickly begins to make this world its own.

It’s a rare occasion when Nic Cage is part of a film which truly matches his idiosyncrasies and the frankly bizarre acting decisions he inevitably brings to the table, but with ‘Color Out of Space’ Stanley provides him with a canvas so weird and out there that he hardly needs to go ‘full Cage’ to bolster the film’s craziness credentials. Captaining us through a dark psychedelic trip and blackly comical hallucinatory journey which underlines Stanley’s penchant for oneirism, graphic violence and otherworldly qualities—all proclivities no doubt nurtured by his lifelong devotion to Lovecraft—abandoning subtlety for a full-on kaleidoscopic experience that slaps you right in the face, while leaving you questioning everything you just witnessed.

Produced by Elijah Wood and his production company SpectreVision, who are developing a reputation for bold and hallucinatory horror and black comedy, ‘Color Out of Space’ sees them deliver a second psychedelic and colourfully macabre indie horror starring Nic Cage in the last two years after 2018’s ‘Mandy’.

If three is the magic number then purple is the magic colour here, or a pinkish purple to be more exact, a bizarre hypnotic hue not meant for human eyes, the seed of the crashed meteorite infiltrating and transforming everything it touches, a gift from the cosmic gods meant to re-forge everything it touches into the form of the world from which it came. And Stanley teams up with music video cinematographer Steve Annis to paint a striking and brilliant CGI-infused picture which covers the real world like a metaphysical cosmic blanket, reminiscent of recent transcendental sci-fi journey ‘Annihilation’, a film with which ‘Color Out of Space’ shares much both stylistically and thematically, leaving us with the impression that Stanley may have been influenced by Alex Garland’s work, but sure that Garland was heavily inspired by H.P. Lovecraft.

Yet while both films may be time and mind-bending alien invasion films which challenge both their protagonists and the audience by playing with the nature of time and space, ‘Color Out of Space’ is far less of an introspective human drama and much more of a good old fashioned genre piece and gonzo horror film, with all the black comedy and absurdist elements which just seem to make sense in a world where nothing else does. All of which gives Nic Cage plenty of fodder for over-the-top behaviour and a chance to hilariously eat up the scenery, which somehow combines perfectly with the film’s true horror credentials—a Carpenter and Cronenberg-esque blend of blood, gore and body horror combined with some psychological terror—while the rest of the cast play it fairly straight, with Madeleine Arthur as the eldest Gardner kid proving the moral heart and sane core of the piece.

Having to adapt a Lovecraft a short story, as all of the author’s work was, Stanley and co-writer Scarlett Amaris have a clear basic story outline and strong narrative themes to draw from but not that much else, doing their best to string out plot, action and spectacle while maintaining a hallucinatory tone and surreal sensibilities. But ultimately ‘Color Out of Space’ is all over the place, yet given the people involved it’s perhaps inevitable and arguably fitting, but it still struggles when stringing together some profundity or a greater context for the cosmic forces at work here.

No doubt Stanley’s long-awaited return might prove an acquired taste, perhaps irking Lovecraft purists with its infusion of black absurdist humour, particularly that of the alpaca variety, and proving just too weirdly dark and tonally uneven for mainstream audiences, while never really rising to the level of tension and horror expected by traditionalists of the genre. For us though the South African filmmaker strikes a curious balance which wins us over and makes his comeback into the feature filmmaking fray by and large a triumphant one. A dazzling and disorientating, hypnotic and occasionally ethereal but mostly ominous and gloriously ludicrous alien invasion flick which rings familiar but feels unique, doing justice to the source material and keeping your eyes glued to the screen . . . for better or worse.

The Bottom Line…

Richard Stanley’s feature filmmaking return stays true to his nature and faithful to the father of cosmic horror which inspired it, while bringing it into the 21^st century and providing a surreal and darkly comedic canvas for its singular star. Weaving together an over-the-top, mind-bending psychedelic alien invasion tale from left field which subverts both expectations and the very nature of space and time—delivering an unapologetic b-movie gonzo genre piece which might divide opinion, but won’t fail to hold your attention.

Similar films you may like (Home Video)

Mandy (2018)

Broken by loss and hell bent on revenge, a man seeks bloody vengeance on the sinister cult and charismatic leader who took from him the love of his life, turning his once idyllic and isolated 1980s existence in the forest wilderness of the American West into a crimson-hued hell on Earth.

Directed by Panos Cosmatos and starring Nicolas Cage, Andrea Riseborough and Linus Roache among others.

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