How sad is this?

Good movie but grossly overrated

As Good As It Gets

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

When I first viewed the film, I was seriously disappointed. It's slow, weird, choppy, inexplicable. Just like a Lovecraft book. (Have you read Lovecraft? Snooze city, seriously!) I would have given this movie a 4.And then . . .Two weeks later, this movie visited my dreams. Associations were formed in my brain. I changed. I would now have given the movie a 6.And I watched the movie again. Now it won't let me go. And once in a while, even these long years later . . . I find myself pulling down the DVD.It's a mistake to judge the movie against any specific Lovecraft book and a mistake to expect a literal interpretation of any book. The film takes an idea and runs with it, it runs, slowly, implacably, and very, very far.And my brain, MY BRAIN, it says GIVE THIS FILM AN 8!

this was a pretty good version of Shadow Over Innsmouth, right down to several of the same characters from the original, such as a young liquor store clerk. i find it embarrassing that so many fellow Lovecraft fans seem to have sexual hangups, complaining about the gay element of the story. who cares? it completely works for the character and the store (adding to his outsider mentality) and is *not a big deal*. geeze! grow up! the general mood and atmosphere was completely Lovecraftian. uneasiness. not quite seeing things clearly... dread, gloom. these things the film did perfectly.

This movie has nothing to do with any printed reference to Cthulhu written by H.P. Lovecraft. It is not a Lovecraft film, doesn't even come close to wanting to be one & has no business referencing Lovecraft in any way, shape or form.It is H O M O S E X U A L P R O P A G A N D A. Yep. It's totally gay. I strongly suspect the writer believes the director should be shot. This is a story about gay lovers. It has an Innsmouth plot thrown in there, and the name Marsh figures in prominently, but one could just as easily take all that out and it wouldn't make a bit of difference whatsoever.This is a chick-flick for gay men. Period. It's completely disgusting. The director *should* be shot.

Point-- For those of you who are wanting to see a modern FX crack at Cthulhu himself. That does NOT happen here. Nor does it happen in the Lovecraft Story this movie is based on. The movie does not go this route-- and rightly so. To even do so, in my opinion, would be to destroy the dark shadowy allure of this Monster God.The point of this movie is Strangeness, paranoia, isolation and fear with something sick & occult happening at the edges as it draws the main character 'Russ' back into the clutches of his strange family and it's dark hold on an isolated Oregon fishing town.In the Lovecraft stories, the story of this character is told second hand by the narrator who draws his own assumptions from fragmented letters from his 'Friend' who had reluctantly returned to Innsmouth and his strange family. And in the story-- we never see or hear of an end: the 'Friend' disappears and no more letters are sent.Here, we are seeing the man's struggles firsthand. The fact that he is gay is an interesting side-twist.The tone is well-tuned, growing desperation as you head towards the climax. And the sparsely applied FX are well done. I urge viewers to let the sequences in question fly past at normal speed. That's what makes it work. Good Stagecraft/FX rarely withstand the Slow-Motion acid test-- so be fair to this movie and keep your finger OFF the Pause button.And for those of you who have a problem with the Ending: Remember that there are really NO Happy Endings or Narrow Escapes in the Lovecraft Universe. And yes, for you purists-- this is a story about DAGON, NOT really Cthulhu. . .but hey! It's all the same Elder God Pantheon anyways.By the way-- I consider this movie a BETTER version of the movie "Dagon"I am keeping my fingers crossed for "Mountains of Madness"!