Motion Picture Purgatory: The Whisperer in Darkness
Debi Moore
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In the description of The Whisperer in Darkness on the Fantasia Film Festival website, the claim is made that the film “very well may be the single most successful H.P. Lovecraft adaptation ever to lick fear across a screen.” High praise indeed! Read on to see if Trembles agrees with it.
Synopsis: The place: Arkham, Massachusetts. Fresh after losing a ferocious public debate with a specialist in the occult, Miskatonic University professor Albert Wilmarth (Matt Foyer) finds himself more than a little curious about documents sent to him by a terrified Vermont farmer who insists that mysterious creatures have been appearing all over his town. He has photographed hoof prints in the soil near his home, and he is very, very afraid. Professor Wilmarth steps onto a train for Vermont and begins a journey that will plunge him in the centre of a terrifying conspiracy. One that is, unquestionably, not of this earth. Ready or not, the Old Ones are coming.
Directed by Sean Branney, Whisperer is the first feature film from a collective who call themselves The H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society (their masterful short The Call of Cthulhu was the object of much love at Fantasia in 2006). Shot with an aesthetic, production design, and performance style angled to emulate the feel of a ’30s/’40s Universal horror film — without falling into camp — Whisperer arrives like shadows out of time, a discovered relic from another dimension.
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