Could someone give a general summary of what the "colour" was?
The story is about the destructive effects a meteorite has on a local family. It's a malignancy to everything that it influences, from the plant life to the very humans themselves. The "colour" was an alien life form unlike anything ever encountered. At first you think that maybe it is just radioactive and the radiation makes things grow, sour, then die. But as the story progresses, there begins to be a hint that something more is at work. Remember how the trees acted, moving on their own when there was no wind? It was as if they were somehow alive or under some sort of outside influence that could only be hinted at or sensed, but not directly seen. In Lovecraft's book, animals became mutated or tainted as well. The movie didn't have the budget to show the abnormal growth of the plants or the mutated animals from the book, hence why we only got some overly large fruit and a rather large bee.
What is it that happens when all the "colours" come together and go off into space?
It would seem to me that the life form matured and garnered the power to return to outer space for purposes we cannot know, maybe on a purely instinctual level. The film makes a mistake, in my opinion, by showing all of the "colour" come together and ascend into the heavens. In the book, one small bit fails to be caught up in the ascension and settles back down into the Earth, which leads one to ponder the water of the reservoir that will soon cover all of the land, whether it too is tainted. The film gives us that threat at the end, but it doesn't quite work because it shows all of the "colour" departing.
Why does the color make everyone go crazy?
Simply put, it was poisonous to humans, much like radiation would be. And ultimately, it seemed to be feeding on everything around it in a slow, dreadful way. In the book, the "colour" has a presence when it manifests and comes for people, such as when it came for Nahum Gardner.
And what is the surprise ending? Was it that the older man had actually killed the boy by the well?
See, the film was being a bit too artsy-fartsy to make good sense here. The older man did not kill the boy. The boys had disappeared at the well earlier in the film, and in Lovecraft's story, it is revealed that their dead bodies are at the bottom of the well, having fallen there when the "colour" claimed them. It is revealed that this is where the manifesting "colour" resides. The film was trying to be overly clever in concealing the fate of the boy and then at the end revealing that he had died in the well. To further discuss the film's plot deviations...
If so, what did that have to do with the colour? (If not, what was the point of that scene?)
The wrap-around story of the young man searching for his father was created entirely for the film. It really has no relevance to the story at all other than attempting to showcase the idea that once you've seen the "colour", it never leaves you. This was the film's biggest weakness, as it simply never ties the old man (who had witnessed the "colour" when he was in the army so long ago) to the story in any sort of satisfactory way. He's just used as an excuse to give Armin someone to tell the story too and it falls flat. He never drank the water at the Nahum farm, so one can assume he is not infected by the "colour". He's just there and mentally disturbed for no other reason than to tediously bring his son there so that the story can be told to him. It was badly incorporated, in my opinion. As far as events at the farm are concerned, they captured the essence of Lovecraft's take decently enough, even if unable to portray everything as written.
- - - - - - -
Whose idea was it for the word "Lisp" to have an "S" in it?
reply
share
armitage-14
10 years ago
I realize that it's been several months and this post will likely never be read, but I just watched the movie last night. You really need to rewatch the last several minutes of the movie.
The old man was lying throughout his story.
-The Colour was in his well, on his farm.
-Most of the things that he described as happening to his neighbors actually happened to him.
-He threw his neighbor's son into the well to feed the Colour.
-The soldier never destroyed the well, the Colour never left, and they had both been under its influence since the `40s.
reply
share
mrannah
10 years ago
i disagree slightly. i don't think the old man was lying; i think he was telling the truth as far as it went, but like the main character's father, there was a part he wasn't sharing. Like the father, he had been influenced by it, while not destroyed as the original family had been, but was unable to leave the area (as the american had been haunted by it) and neither of them able or willing to act against it.
at least that's how i saw it
reply
share
armitage-14
10 years ago
The flashbacks at the end were all scenes from earlier in the movie, but with the old man and his neighbor in reversed roles.
He was at the crater, showing the meteorite to the scientists.
He was showing off his abnormally large fruit to his neighbor.
His neighbor was asking him if he needed any help.
...and so on.
It's like the Shirley Jackson short story "Charles", in which a child regularly tells his mother about all of the trouble caused in class by a boy named Charles, until it's revealed at the end that there is no Charles and it was actually that child himself who has been misbehaving.
reply
share
venusboys3
9 years ago
That was my take on it as well. It was a quick stream of scenes but it definitely gave me the impression that the story the older man told was not entirely true. It was more like he was doing the bidding of the colour, as was the father at the end.
reply
share
billybobd
8 years ago
That doesn't explain why he would be willing to tell the story to the young man, but the shot of the little boy at the well is very ominous an ambiguous. There is also the line from the melting farmer (did this incident actually happen?) where he claims the color can read minds.
A big mistake, in my opinion. Lovecraft's aim with his story was to make an incomprehensible horror and the color influencing people to do its bidding is a too-comprehensible interaction between whatever-it-is and humans and seems to lend it some volition and goals, a big problem if it's supposed to be incomprehensible.
An adaptation certainly doesn't have to hew very closely to its source but Lovecraft's idea is more interesting than an alien which controls people's minds.
Depicting it as what clearly seems to be blobs of liquid was also a misstep as it's once again too easy to understand. In the story the farmer can only describe it as "just a colour".
reply
share
venusboys3
8 years ago
Agreed, it seems like they're attempts to 'improve' on the original story ended up truncating much of its impact.
Then again, I'm not sure The Color Out Of Space is the best choice of Lovecraft stories to attempt to film.
reply
share