Dagon (2001)

NIGHT 12

 

     "Fuck Dagon!"

 

Dagon (2001) is a Spanish, Lovecraftian, survival horror film directed by Stuart Gordon and based on the novella The Shadow over Innsmouth by H.P. Lovecraft. This is the final (as in most recent) film directed by Stuart Gordon that's based on a Lovecraft story following Re-Animator (1985), From Beyond (1996) and Castle Freak (1995). This film was apparently originally supposed to be his follow up to Re-Animator but he couldn't get the financing to make it until 15 years later!

Paul and his girlfriend Barbara are recent millionaires on vacation, boating somewhere off the coast of Spain. Things suddenly get bad very quickly for them though, when they hear chanting from a nearby medieval village and a huge storm quickly rolls in on top of them slamming their boat on some nearby rocks. Stranded, they go to the locals for help, but something's really not right about these people...

Unlike most contemporary horror films, Dagon (2001) is really good at showing just enough gore and monsters and leaving the rest to your imagination. Note this is in "The Good" section rather than "The Magnificent" section because it show just slightly too much sometimes (more on this in the next section...) This is also very restrained for Stuart Gordon who made the previous films I mentioned that are very much the "show everything for shock value" type.

I found I liked the simplicity of this film, it's literally just a survival horror for most of the film. Which is pretty refreshing in this day and age, but for the length of the film I could have used a bit more content.

Unfortunately one of the worst things about this movie is the cinematography. It's passable but there was quite a few times where I found myself confused about what was happening because the shot was just in too close. For example early on Paul & Barbara are trying to get to shore in a raft while a storm is coming. The raft gets a hole and they realize they're stuck between their origin and destination, the only problem? They have to tell us this. You know what would have been nice? A nice long shot to show us how far away they are from the shore!

This movie could have used a little more padding when it came to characters. We really don't know anything about our protagonist Paul, except that he's suddenly become very rich. I suppose this is to make him more of an everyman so that we can attach our own experience to his but... he's a rich nerd. Right off the bat that narrows down your relate-able audience quite a bit. Luckily this didn't ruin the film for me, but honestly who were the other two characters on the boat with them anyways? Their parents? I still have no idea! This is just another simple mistake that could have been fixed pretty easily early on in the film. Also since this was originally intended to follow Re-Animator it was written with Jeffery Combs and Barbara Crampton in mind for the leads, but by the time he got the money to make it the actors were too old for the parts, so it's possible that those actors could have brought more to the parts but who knows.

I liked the comedy in this film, but there's almost too little to justify it. I feel like they couldn't decide whether to make it a straight horror or comedy so instead there's just a couple really funny jokes here and there. You have to commit dammit!

The computer graphics in this film are god-awful. We're talking Sci-Fi channel original movie bad. Granted these are the still the somewhat early years of CG and the budget for the film isn't super high and it is used sparingly even, but I would have just done without. It more than anything else, dates the film really badly.

Also I really didn't like the ending. (SPOILERS obviously to follow...) I understand this is truthful to the original story but the reveal at the end of his familiar ties to this village is just way too late and convenient to be convincing. And we've been following this guy for an hour and a half and for him to just give up and give in at the last minute leaves a really bad taste in your mouth. You could have given him more in the story early on to tell that he has the possibility to go down that path (AND HIM HAVING A DREAM AT THE BEGINNING ISN'T ENOUGH.)

The thing Dagon does really well is create a very simple survival horror. The protagonist is very simply a normal guy and at no point during the movie does he do anything that you or I couldn't do. There's something really refreshing about this and it really adds to the actual horror of the movie. The film has a really good pace and things progressively get weirder for our protagonist at a good speed. When things get weird, he get's weirded out. When he thinks all is lost he starts doing bolder and more extreme things. This just works really well in the movies favor making the movie a very enjoyable ride the whole way through.

Also worth mentioning this was the final film of Francisco Rabal, who I didn't know at all but apparently he's one of the biggest Spanish actors who ever lived and you can really tell from his performance in this film. He really plays a great role as the drunk Ezequiel who ends up being a very unexpected ally for Paul. What a great way to go out, such a magnificent performance here.

Dagon (2001) isn't a great film, but it is a very good horror film, and definitely worth checking out if you have any passing interest in the weird and supernatural.

3.5/5 Stars.

Happy watching!





We're slowly winding down on our string of Lovecraft films on the 31 Days of Macabre Movies, tomorrow we continue with the all-new silent film The Call of Cthulhu (2005).

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