Color Out of Space (2019)
Nicolas Cage, Madeleine Arthur, Joely Richardson, Brendan Meyer, Julian Hilliard, Elliot Knight, Tommy Chong, Josh C Waller
Directed by: Richard Stanley

I wasn’t sure if I wanted to see this one, which I guess is why it took so long for me to decide to watch. But I’m very glad I did.

The Gardner family lives on a remote farm. One night a meteor falls from the sky in a flash of light. The consequences of this might just be apocalyptic.

I’m generally not a fan of Nic Cage going nuts. I read the story this movie was based on, and didn’t think it would benefit from a Cage-ian meltdown (or 5). But I’m glad I finally watched it, it was quite good. Cage actually delivers what, for him, is a very subdued performance… for the first half anyways. He gets progressively more unhinged as the movie goes on, but in context, it really works. He’s supposed to be slowly losing his mind, and no one does that better than Cage.

The film looks beautiful. They decided on a stunning shade of pink for the actual colour, and it’s not a colour generally found in nature, so it gave everything a surreal, dreamlike quality when it was flying around. I have to give the movie major props for not trying to explain the colour, either. Lovecraft’s work is mostly about the unknown and unknowable, and this movie beautifully captured this. The colour simply was, no explanation needed. Actually, this movie has to be the most Lovecraftian Lovecraft adaptation I’ve ever seen, and that’s impressive.

Everything in the film is quite well done. The pacing, while a little slow at first, really finds its footing in the second half. The acting is all pretty good, the characters believable. The makeup and gore effects were pretty amazing, too. I won’t go too much into it, just in case anyone else hasn’t seen it yet and my review helps them wants to, but suffice to say the practical effects are on full glorious display and I was totally there for it.

So, do I recommend it? If you’re a fan of Lovecraft, yes, absolutely. If you need explications for things, you may not like it. Me? I give it a very good 8/10.

M.

This movie isn’t streaming anywhere (in Canada) right now, but it’s available for rent or purchase on Amazon Prime and YouTube.

ps: it was really hard for me to write the title as “Color”…