Lovecraft's 15 minutes

This is the trailer for The Eldritch Influence. At first glance, it looks like it does for the Lovecraft fans/mythos what Comic Book: The Movie did for comic fans. One can certainly hope. I enjoyed Comic Book: The Movie quite a bit.

As this is the second post that deals with Lovecraftian oddities, it's probably fairly obvious that I'm a fan. Stumbled across his work in High School and have enjoyed it ever since. Were I either slightly *cough cough* younger, or married to someone that was a little more willing to participate in pen and paper RPGs I'd be a big fan of the Cthulhu RPG from Chaosium. It was starting up (I think) just as I was leaving that particular pastime behind. I think every so often about giving it a go, but it's more of a pipe dream.

But I still enjoy visiting Lovecraft's world through his own writings and the writings of others that enjoy playing in the playground. Neil Gaiman's recent A Study in Emerald was quite enjoyable (just as much for the ads as the story) as are several of the stories found in other anthologies. In fact, the Shadows Over Baker Street anthology looks to be doubly enjoyable.

One of the things that I really enjoy about his work, is that despite the great variance in his writing ability, you almost always get glimpses of the world that he was building. From the almost universally known Necronomicon, to good ol' Miskatonic U. to the surreal New England depicted in Innsmouth. Even if the writing was subpar, the fantasy wasn't. The fact that elements of his world have entered pop culture speaks quite well to that. Hollywood didn't have quite the love affair with his stories that they're currently having with Philip K. Dick, but there were a few gems produced. And it would be interesting to see what someone like David Fincher would create with some of his pieces.

Oddly, the only Lovecraft I have in the house is a biography of the man himself and a trimmed photocopy of The Thing on the Doorstep. I keep waiting for a nice anthology of his works that collects more than just a couple stories from his various periods. If one exists certainly point me in its direction.