Welcome to the July 2015 Cinematic Meeting!
The theme for this meeting was Spanish Lovecraftian Horror, which can mean only one thing: The Valdemar Legacy.
Spanish horror is fantastic. Spanish cinema is fantastic, actually. It’s a shame they don’t have a bigger market, which is why it is my duty, as Chairman, to introduce you to these things if you didn’t beat me to it.
Aromatic Accompaniment: Midnight Berry by Chesapeake Bay Candle.
I first saw this film at the 2013 HP Lovecraft Film Festival in Portland, Oregon, where patrons were bulging out of the back of the theatre in order to see the screen. I myself was lucky enough to have a wall to lean on. Regrettably, it was very difficult to find this movie until recently. It has only recently become available to an American audience, as it has finally debuted on Amazon Instant Watch (and is free for Prime members!) this year. The last time I checked it was not available on Netflix (even on DVD).
So what is the movie about?
It’s about Lovecrafty things. It pays clever homage both to the mythos and real-life history surrounding the figures of the period (the title of the film is an allusion to the Edgar Allan Poe story, “The Facts of the Case of M. Valdemar,” for example), and it is a damn good film. Scary, too. The plot revolves around a well-meaning couple who run an orphanage. The husband gets in trouble for getting caught charging for faked seances. Who should come to his rescue? Why, none other than Aleister Crowley, The Black Magician himself!
At first the couple are grateful, but it soon becomes clear that Crowley had an agenda. He believes that the husband’s powers to contact the beyond are real, and forces him to agree to a little party–a veritable gaggle of literary and historical cameos composes the guest list, including Lizzy Borden and Bram Stoker.
The movie itself is constructed of a frame narrative, which adds to the mystery of the Valdemar House, for which the movie is named. The house is being appraised, and one appraiser has already gone missing. His company assumes he ran off with the valuables, but we know better, don’t we Dear Reader? A replacement appraiser is called in, and when she arrives at the house the crusty groundskeeper asks why they are sending a second appraiser. Not good.
When the second appraiser disappears as well, an investigator is called in, and the origin of the Valdemar House is related to him over the course of a train ride.
For those who enjoy such things, this is a marvelous romp through the mythos, constructed in an intelligent, scary, and amusing manner.
Content References from the July 2015 Cinematic Meeting
The Valdemar Legacy. Dir. Jòse Luis Alemàn. La Cruzada Entertainment, 2010 (Spain). Film. IMDB link: <http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1242744/>
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