English Dept.
I think the goal in making a Lovecraftian horror film is a kind of balance. With Lovecraft, if something is hard to think about, then it's hard to put into words. And if it's hard to express verbally, then it's nearly impossible to show. Fabulous creatures tinged with a hint of sci-fi with a story that conjures the internal emotions and abstract themes of like a Bergman film. It's Buñuel with slime from the intersection of time and space.
H.P.’s work takes place primarily in and around New England — though it’s largely a New England of his own devising. Existing cities and towns appear throughout, complemented by locations Lovecraft invented, with names like Dunwich, Innsmouth, Kingsport, and Arkham. Some are based on real places, others are amalgams of towns Lovecraft knew about. Lovecraft’s bigotry comes out most acutely in his descriptions of these places; even though they’re in his beloved New England, they’re often peopled by “lowly” types Lovecraft would have avoided at all costs.
Every element of The Void has been crafted by its filmmakers with the utmost attention to detail. We have to assume that as with the best films, regardless of genre, every choice is intentional. Nothing in the frame has escaped the eye of the director, the cinematographer, the production designer. But as you're watching, of course, you ask yourself, What is it? Because I don't think we're really sure as the pieces begin to fall into place. I'm not sure we can even really be sure what it is when we get to the conclusion.
It's set up from the start like a Lovecraft story with what would appear to be an unreliable (by virtue of insanity) narrator, whose flashback would seem to comprise the bulk of the storytelling. But it is specifically this unreliability, which we are led to expect from this character, which throws all manner of doubt onto easily interpreting what's real versus what isn't.
