Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)

“Every generation has a story.”

Directed by JJ Abrams
Starring Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Adam Driver, Harrison Ford, Oscar Isaacs, Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill and… just a fucktonne of good people

Note: This is going to be a spoilerific, wikitastic review. Continue at your own risk.

Thirty years on, a new Republic has risen, but Luke Skywalker has disappeared and the galaxy is threatened by the rise of the First Order, an implacable military-industrial superpower thriving in the absence of the Jedi. Ex-Princess Leia (Fisher) leads a Resistance movement within First Order space (yes, Leia is now a CIA-backed insurgent) while searching for her missing brother.

The Summer of Lovecraft: Cthulhu (2007)

“Welcome home to the end of the world.”

Directed by Daniel Gildark
Starring Jason Cottle, Scott Green, Richard Garfield, Cara Buono and Tori Spelling

The Story

Written in 1931, “The Shadow Over Innsmouth” is a story of a corrupted seaside town with a dark secret. The narrator visits the port of Innsmouth, where he discovers that the locals have a distinctive “look” and that strange things are afoot. When a talkative local soak tells the narrator that the townsfolk have made a pact with the “Deep Ones” — humanoid undersea creatures — the local cult, the Esoteric Order of Dagon, pursues him. Eventually he gets away, but he discovers that the heritage of the town is in his blood and that he too will begin the metamorphosis into a Deep One.

Happyfett’s Note: A particularly popular source of literary inspiration, ‘The Shadow Over Innsmouth’ has produced not one, but at least three volumes of more or less faithful (often much less) tribute fiction. Reviews of the first volume, Shadows Over Innsmouth can be found on my books blog.

The Film

In the near future, the world is falling apart as a result of political strife and climate change. University professor Russel Marsh (Cottle) receives word that his mother has died. Reluctantly, he returns to his hometown of Rivermouth in coastal Washington, where he discovers that strange things are afoot. When Marsh goes against the sinister cult run by his father, the cult frames him for a crime he didn’t commit. Society begins to break down as the cult’s plan comes to fruition, and Marsh has to choose between his father’s schemes and his growing but uncertain relationship with childhood sweetheart Mike (Green). 

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)

This poster is misleadingly ‘war; fuck yeah!’

“One Last Chance for Peace”

Directed by Matt Reeves
Starring Andy Serkis, Jason Clarke and Gary Oldman

Ten years after the collapse of human civilisation in the wake of the simian flu pandemic, Caesar’s (Serkis) peaceful ape colony is thriving in the Muir Woods. When humans enter their territory seeking to restore a hydroelectric dam, however, old tensions and old hatreds threaten both groups with destruction.

The Summer of Lovecraft: Cast a Deadly Spell (1991)

The effects are not as special as this poster makes out.

“The Comedy Detective Thriller with Very Special Effects”

Directed by Martin Campbell
Starring Fred Ward, David Warner, Julianne Moore, Clancy Brown and Alexandra Powers

The Story

Okay, in fairness this one isn’t based on a specific Lovecraft story.

The Film

H. Philip Lovecraft (Ward) is a private detective in LA 1948, a city where everyone uses magic; everyone except Lovecraft. Hired by wealthy Amos Hackshaw (Warner) to recover his copy of the Necronomicon, he follows the trail of the thief through a world in which he knows almost everyone, from ex-partner-turned-hoodlum Harry Bordon (Brown) to old flame Connie Stone (Moore).

The Summer of Lovecraft: The Resurrected (1992)

“Death used to be the end. Now it’s only the beginning.”

Directed by Dan O’Bannon
Starring John Terry, Jane Sibbett and Chris Sarandon

The Story

Written in 1927 but not published during Lovecraft’s life, “The Case of Charles Dexter Ward” is a more or less traditional horror tale that plays with a pretty typical Lovecraftian theme, that of the past coming back to haunt someone obsessed with it. It’s been adapted a few times — it has a pretty limited effects budget, and the actorly gimmick at the core of the story is popular.

The Skull (1965)

Our Christopher Lee retrospective continues here on BMM, as we celebrate the great man’s career with a guide to all the many different times he glared intently at Peter Cushing and boomed some hard-sounding shit that, on sober reflection, didn’t necessarily make a whole lot of sense. Or perhaps I’m just referring to this film, 1965’s The Skull:

“When the skull strikes, you’ll scream!”

Directed by Freddie Francis
Starring Peter Cushing, Patrick Wymark, Jill Bennett and Christopher Lee

Review by gonzohistory, with comments from happyfett.

Back in 18-umpty-ump, a phrenologist digs up a grave, steals the corpse’s head and defleshes the skull. But he promptly dies in a tragic but totally-foreseeable skull-defleshing accident.

Flash forward to swinging London, where Christopher Maitland and Matthew Phillips (Cushing and Lee) are collectors of occult artefacts. Shady antiquities dealer Marco (Wymark) turns up with the skull for sale; he offers it to Maitland, claiming that it’s the skull of the infamous Marquis de Sade. Maitland turns him down, but gradually he becomes fascinated, especially when it appears that the skull was actually stolen from Phillips, who is convinced that it actually contains an evil spirit.

It does. And also there’s a cult of weirdos who dress up like judges and make people play Russian roulette. Or maybe it’s just a dream. And Marco gets murdered, leaving Maitland with the skull. Eventually the skull keeps trying to get Cushing to kill his wife (Bennett) but he doesn’t, and instead he kills himself– or does he?!

He doesn’t; it was the skull.

Tron: Legacy (2010)

In all seriousness, this is the climax of the movie right on the poster.

“The Only Rule is Survival*”

Directed by Joseph Kosinski
Starring Jeff Bridges, Garrett Hedlund, Olivia Wilde, Bruce Boxleitner and Michael Sheen

Twenty years after the disappearance of his father, software pioneer Kevin Flynn (Bridges), Sam Flynn (Hedlund) is a troubled young man. Receiving a message from his father, he visits Flynn senior’s old arcade and is transported into the virtual world of the Grid, where a program with his father’s face rules a fascist dystopia.

Daybreakers (2009)

This movie contains no actual ‘blood wars’. It is at best a blood skirmish.

“Let the Blood Wars Begin”

Directed by Michael and Peter Spierg
Starring Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill and Claudia Karvan

Beginning in 2009, a plague has swept across the globe, converting the majority of the world’s population into vampires. Humanity is a rapidly dwindling resource. Synthetic blood seen as the only alternative to starvation and devolution into monstrous, vampire-eating ‘subsiders’, but a few human survivors and their vampire sympathisers plan to find a different solution; a cure.

Season of the Witch (2011)

“All Hell will break loose”

Directed by Dominic Sena
Starring Nicholas Cage, Ron Perlman and Claire Foy

Two war-weary crusaders are charged with escorting a witch to a remote monastery, where she can be tried and the plague with which she has cursed the land dispelled.

The Maze Runner (2014)

At least one of the characters in this poster image is never seen running the maze.

“Get Ready to Run”

Directed by Wes Ball
Starring  Dylan O’Brien, Kaya Scodelario, Aml Ameen, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Ki Hong Lee, Will Poulter and Blake Cooper

Waking in an elevator cage, Thomas (O’Brien) is propelled into the Glade, a community of boys imprisoned in the heart of a vast and shifting maze.