Dagon (2001)

You won't be disappointed!

Powerful

Good start, but then it gets ruined

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

In "Dagon", Paul and his girlfriend, Barbara, go on a trip to Spain, but after suffering an accident with their boat, they end up stranded in a gloomy harbor port called Imboca. After a series of incidents, Paul becomes separated from his girlfriend, so he goes on a search all around the town to find her. For some reason, the villagers from Imboca are out to get Paul, but he manages to escape the angry horde. Through the story of a homeless guy named Ezequiel, Paul learns that several years ago, there was a fish shortage in the town of Imboca, which caused a lot of despair among the villagers. One day, an evil sailor introduced the townspeople to a new god called Dagon and forced them to abandon their catholic religion. Dagon eventually brought a lot of wealth to the town, but in return, he demanded live sacrifices and women to breed with him. Progressively, Imboca became a dark and isolated place, inhabited by fish-like creatures, which live to worship their beastly god. During Paul's search, he comes across a strange "girl" named Uxia, who is also the high priestess of the Order of Dagon and she seems to be in love with him. Paul decides to continue with his search, unaware of the fact that the townspeople, led by Uxia, want to offer Barbra as a sacrifice to Dagon.Director Stuart Gordon offers a dark and even depressing atmosphere in this film that deals with the classic theme of innocent people stranded in a deserted place, where they meet a gruesome fate. While the story is simple, as it mostly features Paul escaping from the angry villagers, it manages to provide an hour and a half of genuine horror with dignity, avoiding never ending fillers that lead to nothing. In some way, I suppose "Dagon" may sound similar to a zombie flick, but in this case, it seems like the angry horde actually has something personal against Paul, which makes the whole thing more intriguing, since we don't get to know why, until the very end. Paul's quest becomes exciting, as we get to see the mysteries surrounding Imboca slowly unraveling. My main satisfaction with this film is due to the perfect location, because I believe that the filming locations are very relevant in these types of horror films, where the setting usually works as another character that interacts with the rest. The fictional town of Imboca (which is actually called Combarro) makes the perfect horror scenery for this nightmare-like story; it looks frightening, even depressing, and it is always raining heavily throughout the entire film, which makes things even more difficult for the main character. Aside from the Combarro landscapes, we see a decaying hotel that seems to have been deserted for a long time, which gives a feeling of uneasiness and discomfort. Abandoned places always seem to provoke distress, because they give the feeling that they are cut out from the rest of society, the modern civilized word and its false securities. The Spanish architecture of the houses and mansions are somehow more unpolished and rustic than the architecture that we normally see in American horror films, and I find this rusticity to be also frightening, as it gives me the idea that the people from this place have some kind of a ferocious nature and aren't exactly tamed. As for the bizarre villains, which in this case are mostly the townspeople, I thought this was a great achievement; the idea of merging humans and sea creatures as the main antagonists is perfect. These characters hardly ever talk, they mostly make strange noises, they walk around in a weird animalistic way, and most of them cover their pale fish-like faces with scarves and the rest of their bodies with black hooded raincoats. In a way, it reminded me of a zombie film, since these villagers move together in a horde without a mind, chasing the only humans in the town, because they want something from them. Of course, I have seen my share of zombie films and while I can enjoy them from time to time, I found these strange fish-like creatures to be more interesting and scary. The music in "Dagon", composed by Carl Cases is also very fitting. We mostly get to hear the same music throughout the entire film, in which a woman and a chorus of men chant a darkly appealing melody that helps to create a mystical and depressing atmosphere. Of course, I don't think "Dagon" is the perfect film. My main problem with this film is the bad CGI; not only because it looks extremely cheap and amateurish, but also, because it is completely unnecessary. This film could have been much better without this horrible CGI, and while I cannot say that this ruined the movie for me, it cheapens it considerably. I have another criticism concerning the dialogs. Though "Dagon" mostly doesn't provide humor, unlike some of Gordon's previous horror films, I'm sure some of the dialogs in this film are supposed to be intentionally funny, and while I chuckled like it was intended, I find the humor to be out of place in a film like this. Based on "The Shadow over Innsmouth", this film is mostly regarded by Lovecraft fans as a noble effort that actually remains true to the atmosphere and structure of his story. In any case, Dennis Paoli, who writes most of the scripts for Gordon, deserves recognition as well, since "Dagon" doesn't take everything directly from Lovecraft's story. The film deals with a few recurring Lovecraftian elements, such as the impossibility to escape fate, religion and non-human influences on humanity, among others.

Not a fan of Cthulhu, but this engaged me by the end.But ... who cast that idiot as the lead? To be fair to the actor the early part of the film was poorly written, and he did have to carry most of the awful dialogue. Almost all of it reaction stuff, with loads of questions: Over here! Which way? C'mon! What the hell? Some actors don't need to say a word in those situations.The first scene in particular made me hate him, and I was tempted to give up. By the time we reached the house he'd settled down, and became an action man once he'd lost the irritating glasses - "I'm being chased, so I think I'll pause to push up my specs." Anyway, he was acted off the screen by the old exposition chap with the gravelly voice (RIP).The sound and movement of the fishumans was great. But the full length shots of Barbara were a bit coy, especially when she was hauled out of the pit - could have had an amazing silhouette there. I did get a good laugh out of the dangling arms.Overall it starts out cheap and nasty, but ends up camp and enjoyable.

The Shadow over Innsmouth is one of my favourite Lovecraft stories and so I began watching this with some apprehension knowing how unsuccessful many attempts to bring the unique feel of Lovecraft to the screen. I was pleasantly surprised particularly by the beginning of the film which captured the bleak terror of Innsmouth to perfection. The shambling, deformed locals are excellently captured as is the decaying, sodden town. On the downside I wasn't enamoured by the Woody Allen-like lead character unfortunately and found him quite irritating throughout. I found Barbara much more believable as a character and felt she captured the fear of the situation better than the lead male. Also the director's fondness for gore resulted in one of the most explicit and gory scenes I've ever come across in a film but which served no purpose towards the plot whatsoever and just served to undermine the disquieting tone of the earlier part of the film. Still a good effort and definitely enjoyable.

Underrated, great atmospheric horror. It really drags you into your screen.If you haven't seen this movie and you would see the scene which marks the beginning of the Dagon era then i'm sure you can't wait to see it all.I've never seen anything like it.H.P. Lovecraft has many other good stories but I personally think this one is the best screen adaptation. Stuart Gordon did a wonderful job! Castle Freak, The Pit and the Pendulum and From Beyond are also worth watching.