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Lovecraft Mythos Is Reality ?

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Anonymous

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A book out in the 70's called The Dark Gods claimed that along with other such Infamous luminaries such as Crowely and Hitler were actually being used by the ancient ones. The Dark ones were using these figures for there own evil ends. It crosses with the Ultra terrestial theories of John Keel and Flying Saucer Review editors (Crieghton/Bowen) to a certain degree. As it does with all the Jack Parsons/Scorpio Rising stuff. All seem to suggest that some people for whatever reason (natural/aided) seem to be receptive to these Dark Gods. Often will wake up in a dreamlike state/Trance Like and have information passed down to them.
It all sounds pretty awesome.
If anyone has The Dark God to buy or barter, I would dearly love to own it again.
Also does anyone have a follow up to the FT story of wierd underwater sounds emanating from the deep sea trench Cythlu was meant to sleeping near Austrialia.
The Mountains of Madness is due to be made into a fairly big budget movie as well!!!
 
The underwater sounds in the pacific were in 1997 as I recall, which kinda blew off the "CTHULHU IS RISING" theory due to the planetary conjunction round about the time the story appeared :(
No further information Ican find other than "It was probably a giant squid".

the origin news report & the sound itself are at:
http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/06/13/bloop/index.html
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/vents/acoustics/sounds/bloop.html

Yes Mountians of Madness, Beyong the Wall of Sleep and another Herbert West: Reanimator film are all being made just now :)
 
I read this account and thought the submerged temple rising from the sea was a mite too reminiscant of sunken Rlyeh rising from the sea. Either dread Cthulhu dreams in the deep or the captain of the ship was reading "The Call fo Cthulhu" and decided to spin a good yarn to tell once he reached shore...

Article quoted from Tom Slemen's Website

At Number 62 Rodney Street in Liverpool, England, there is a plaque that reads: 'Gladstone, Four times Prime Minister, born in this house, 29th December 1809'.
Gladstone was an impressive reformer, legislator and legendary orator who dominated politics with his Conservative opponent Disraeli. Gladstone was not an imaginative man who was given to flights of fancy; he was tough politician who produced the Home Rule Bills and strove in the midst of controversy to bring peace to Ireland's troubles. Imagine then, how astonished and bemused the members of the House of Commons were in 1886 when Prime Minister Gladstone got to his feet and attempted to get a bill through Parliament. Not some reform bill - but 'a bill to furnish funds to search for the legendary sunken continent of Atlantis.'
There were hoots and howls of laughter from the benches on both sides of the House. Many thought the 77-year-old Premier had become senile, and Gladstone's amazing proposal was defeated. Many wondered what had convinced the mundane and practical Gladstone to seek funds for such an outlandish expedition. There were two reasons. In secret, Gladstone had read a book about Atlantis, an island that is said to have vanished below the Atlantic in the middle of the night, some 10,500 years before the birth of Christ. That book, by an American Congressman named Ignatius Donnelly, captured Gladstone's imagination. Gladstone had also recently heard about an incredible incident concerning a Lancashire adventurer named James T. Morgan. About two years previously, Morgan had been returning to Liverpool from Brazil, where he had been exploring the Matto Grosso and the Amazon for gold. When the ship was in the middle of the Atlantic, about 900 miles from the Azores, a lookout spotted a strange sight. A dark triangular object was visible in the sea, about 80 miles away. By early evening the ship was within a mile of the object, and the Captain and crew could not believe their eyes. The tip of an enormous black pyramid structure was sticking out of the water. The ship's compass started spinning, as if the pyramid was magnetic. The Brazilian captain intended to sail past the strange object, but Morgan urged him to drop anchor. The captain did this, and he allowed Morgan and four of the crew to row a lifeboat over to the pyramid. The structure was made of basalt, and was estimated to have been twice as high as the Great Pyramid in Egypt. Morgan and the navigator on the ship estimated that the pyramid was a staggering 960 feet in height. The pyramid had ledge-like steps going halfway up the structure, and Morgan tried to climb the steps but they were coated with slippery sea vegetation. Morgan and the crewmen returned to the ship and made further measurements of the pyramid. The structure obviously continued downwards under water for quite a distance, so establishing its true dimensions was impossible. During the night, a strange faint glow like St Elmos fire gathered around the tip of the pyramid, and at three in the morning, the captain of the ship insisted he had to continue to Liverpool to keep his deadline. When other ships surveyed the location near the Azores months later, there was no sign of the pyramid. It was as if it had plunged back into the depths of the Atlantic. Was the pyramid the remains of some Atlantean temple that had been sent to the surface because of volcanic upheavals, only to sink back into oblivion? We may know more one day.

By the way, Jeffrey Coombs is finally signed on to reprise the role of Herbert West in "Beyond Reanimator" so there is plenty of hope for the project!
 
Carnacki said:
I read this account and thought the submerged temple rising from the sea was a mite too reminiscant of sunken Rlyeh rising from the sea. Either dread Cthulhu dreams in the deep or the captain of the ship was reading "The Call fo Cthulhu" and decided to spin a good yarn to tell once he reached shore...



By the way, Jeffrey Coombs is finally signed on to reprise the role of Herbert West in "Beyond Reanimator" so there is plenty of hope for the project!


As a Geology Student, that honestly can be explain away straight away. Its likely to be in the middle of the Atlantic, near the mid atlantic ridge, at points peaks from Transform faults raise close tot he surface and it wouldnt be strange to see one above the surface of the ocean.

It was made of basalt......basalt is extruded from such ridges.

The compass acted strange, something with such a large mass as the object describe one have a definate effect on compass readings. Also the magnaitie contained in Basalt if in a large concentration would again effect a compass reading.

Hope that helps :)
 
This Is Why

This is why so many minds of stature state that mankind will not survive religion.

Reason to despair, this stuff.
 
Carnacki said:
By the way, Jeffrey Coombs is finally signed on to reprise the role of Herbert West in "Beyond Reanimator" so there is plenty of hope for the project!

There is a report from Fangoria on the development of this film.
 
Head For the Mountains

There was a rumor a few months back about At the Mountains of Madness being made into a movie, but there was never a follow-up report. Does anyone know?
 
Thanks

Thanks, ghost dog, for the recommendation, been seeking something beyond the godawful clichéd nonsense the publishers and film makers seem content to spew every Hallowe'en season. Benicio Del Torro is a force to be reckoned with, but I've not seen DEVIL'S BACKBONE. I shall indeed rent a copy.
 
Ah, Guillermo

Not Benicio, sorry. LOL

Oh, dear. Post literacy again. In the article your link leads us to, they describe "At the Mountains of Madness" as a Lovecraft short story. LOL Ah, well, at least presumably Del Torro will know better.
 
Poe's Unwritten Sequel

At the Mountains of Madness is a sequel to Poe's Narrative of A. Gordon Pym, itself allegorical as all hell, somewhat anticipating Moby Dick and so on. It's structured more like a long short story, I'd agree. Lovecraft wasn't technically proficient as longer works, diaglogue, and several other things. He did know how to evoke the strange, though.

Yes, I don't know how he'll pull off the cyclopean, as it were. Hope it works well. Could end up awfully cheesy.
 
Have there been any attempts to cellu-lize Lovecraft before? I know there are films based on various of Poe's stories.
 
Some Lovecraft Movies

Yes, there have been some attempts to film Lovecraft, but none has been very good, really. HERBERT WEST, REANIMATOR may be the most popular of recent attempts.

Isn't DIE, MONSTER, DIE actually "The Dunwich Horror" done in awful Grade B horror schlock idiom?

I"m coming up blank! Aaaahhh. tekeli-li!
 
Heh...yeah, just one or two attempts to film Lovecraft's works.

Purchase a copy of Lurker in the Lobby if you want the full details of the following films...

The Haunted Palace
Dark Intruder
Die Monster Die
The Shuttered Room
The Crimson Cult
The Dunwich Horror
Alien
The Fog
The Gates of Hell
The Beyond
Creepshow
The Evil Dead (series)
The Thing
Re-Animator
From Beyond
The Curse (series)
The Unnamable
Cthulhu Mansion
Bride of Re-Animator
Cast a Deadly Spell
The Resurrected
The Unnamable II
Dark Waters
Necronomicon
The Lurking Fear
Witch Hunt
Castle Freak
In the Mouth of Madness
Bleeders
What Are Little Girls Made Of?
Miss Lovecraft Sent Me
Professor Peabody's Last Lecture
Pickman's Model
Cool Air
The Collect Call of Cthulhu
The Hand of Fate
The Whisperer in Darkness
The Haunter of the Dark
The Music of Erich Zann
The Testimony of Randolph Carter
The Outsider
To Oblivion
The Outsider
From Beyond
The Hound
I Am Providence
McLaren
The Case of Howard Phillips Lovecraft
From Beyond
The Outsider
Speaking of the Unspeakable
The Unnamable
Cool Air
Dagon
From Beyond
Return to Innsmouth
H.P. Lovecraft's Nyarlathotep

All of which were (at the very least) inspired by Lovecraft's fiction.

Also there is an H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival, and recently Sheffield had its own HPL section of its Film Festival with Stuart Gordon in attendance.

Might write more tonight when I have a moment.
 
the thing?
I nearly saw that once. bugger, i should have.
Somebody on the blair witch thread pointed out similarities between's it's plot and that of the lurking fear, that I can also see:
  • A big abandoned house
  • on a hill
  • in woods
  • people trying to investigate an intangible horror
  • which is hairy
  • blah blah bla
 
Reaching

Seems to me the list is reaching a bit for some of these. THE THING is based directly upon John W. Campbell's story "Who Goes There?" for example. And as Faggus points out, using vague smilarities doesn't suffice to consider a given movie Lovecraftian.

By the same token, it's not surprising that film makers would pilfer images and ideas from HPL's work without attributing it, so who knows?
 
Re: Reaching

FraterLibre said:
Seems to me the list is reaching a bit for some of these. THE THING is based directly upon John W. Campbell's story "Who Goes There?" for example. And as Faggus points out, using vague smilarities doesn't suffice to consider a given movie Lovecraftian.

By the same token, it's not surprising that film makers would pilfer images and ideas from HPL's work without attributing it, so who knows?

P'rhaps I should clarify. They conduct an interview in the book with Carpenter about Lovecrafts influences upon his work, and the Thing is discussed as where these influences show through (as of course more obviously they do in "Mouth of Madness"). From the horses mouth as it were. Can't cite it verbatim unfortunately as I gave my copy to the friend who was introduced to HPL at the same time as me so many years ago on his birthday.
 
Ah, Influence

I see. I'd thought they claimed it was based on a Lovecraft. Influence I can certainly see, although without Carpenter's testimony it might just as easily have been influence gleaned by any of a number of other horror writers, too, all of whom used the same basic batch of eldritch ichor.

What goes unremarked in most studies of Lovecraft is that he was writing science fictional horror most of the time. Most of his horrors were based on situations that, given other treatment, would have been science fiction set-ups, from invasion, to other dimensions, to breeding experiments between humans and non-humans, etc.

This wasn't inexplicable horror for its own sake, but had a coherent underpinning of rationale and purpose to it. Perhaps that's why it's lasted and even thrived since it first appeared, where most of the rest of the pulp era's stuff has gone by the wayside as irrelevant.

Lovecraft's view of reality as not only cold and indifferent but as often malevolent speaks to us as science expands our knowledge of how truly insignificant we are in the cosmic scheme.
 
And lets not forget that in the non-fiction bopok The Dark Gods, Lovecraft was said to have been directly influenced (unconciously) by the ultraterrestrials/The Old Ones.......

Drooling like Yog-Soggoth over The Mountains Of Madness movie...
 
Alien? Er how is that Lovecraftian?
 
How can a question be wrong? Anyway, copy and paste away!
 
Ultra-terrestrials?

They're extraterrestrials who wear cool shades and leather jackets, right?

Actually, if ultra means "The most extreme" then Ultraterrestrials would be MORE terrestrial than all other beings. Hm.

Amazing what they're calling nonfiction these days, isn't it?

p23 - I suspect horror readers who don't read much if any science fiction labeled as such find Lovecraft's use of extraterrestrial entities definitive or something, whereas actually it fits neatly into a spectrum of thinking and writing going back to the gnostics and beyond.

Who said that? Me?

Mara, obviously.
 
Ultraterrestrials are the messengers of deception, the manipulators of humankind, The Old Ones etc etc. They are written about directly in John Keels books and In "The Dark Gods".
The guys withs dark glasses are Men in Black who work for them-Got it?:eek!!!!:
 
Who Got What

Lucas - Uh, yeah. Thanks for clarifying. lol
 
Have to say your point about what "Ultra" means is exactly how John Keel meant it. "They" have been around here on Earth longer than us (The 8th Tower etc). Rather like Forts " We are Property" statement. Ultraterrestrial was really coined to suggest "They" were not aliens from another planet(i.e Extraterrestrial)-so spot on.
 
Wasn't "Ultraterrestrials" also a term used by Philip K. Dick?
 
Even Keel

I'm glad to hear this. I've not yet read, or even found a copy of, The 8th Tower, but I have read The Mothman Prophecies and quite liked it. Also, I've read several of Jacques Vallée's books, and Colin Wilson's excellent Alien Dawn, and so many others I'm unable to think of them all.

Hadn't read specifically about Ultraterrestrials, but must admit it's a cogent theory.

p23 - I can't recall PKD using it, but maybe. Any specific title come to mind? He incorporated an amzaing number of references in his work.
 
I think he had similar theories but I'm just mixing up the two because they are both mentioned in an essay I once read.
 
John Keel, Jaques Vallee and Gorden Creighton (FSR) are the 3 main contenders for pursueing, at least a version of the Ultra-terrestrial theory, although all would disagree on the finer points. I have a great deal of time for Vallee and really feel he is a torch/hammer in the inpenetratable darkness/hall of mirrors that is UFOLOGY. I adore Keel but feel he has to be using journalistic/artistic licence somewhere along the line. And the world would not be the same without Creighton's Flying Saucer Review, an excellant old skool magazine with a healthy mix of the incredulous and credulous.
Throughout history there has been a manipulation of our beliefs by a force based on Earth,which use frames of referance to stage shows for us, but for what or who's benefit. Vallee relates it to a system of reninforcement/a thermosat for human learning, Keel as a trojan horse; what is really behind the charade and Creighton as malevolent Satananic psychic vampires tricking us and milking us.
Remember: Fort states We are Cattle......:eek!!!!:
 
Wilsonian Vampies

Colin Wilson's novel The Space Vampires is about exactly this. (Do not go by the god-awful movie they made using his book as an excuse to get production funding.)

However, I do wonder why you are so sure The Prankster Other is evil, or some kind of psychic vampire? (Mara, Horla, etc.)

Vallee also said, along with Hynek, that the UFO phenomenon, when viewed from a meta level, resembled nothing so much as an intelligence agency's disinformation campaign.
 
I do not think that that the cosmic trickster/ultraterrestrials/8th Tower/The Old Ones etc etc are evil, although possibly sinister. It all really depends if its a concious manipulation of us or if this is all an unconcious by-product of human imagination and anxities.
If this is some concious "entitiy(ies)" then what is the agenda. Is it a learning curve/thermostat like Vallee states or a Trojan Horse like Keel states. I swing between the two.
Having read all Vallee's books concluding very recently with Forbidden Science-I do believe he may have some of the fundemental foundations in place.:eek!!!!:
 
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