Guillermo del Toro reveals never-before-seen CGI test footage from his unmade Lovecraft film At the Mountains of Madness. Del Toro became an Oscar-winner for his 2017 creature feature The Shape of Water. But years earlier, the director tried to make his true dream project: an ambitious R-rated adaptation of Lovecraft’s story At the Mountains of Madness. Unfortunately, the filmmaker's plans fell through, leaving his would-be horror masterpiece seemingly lost in limbo forever.
Given At the Mountains of Madness’ status as a del Toro dream film, it’s no surprise that fans still yearn to see it made, and that del Toro still brings it up from time-to-time. But now the filmmaker has given fans their biggest taste yet of what his vision for the Lovecraft film might have been. Casually and out of nowhere, del Toro just posted a brief clip showing a CGI test for At the Mountains of Madness, in which a soldier in an ice cave is confronted by a truly horrifying and very Lovecraftian creature. See the chilling clip in the space below:
Why At The Mountains Of Madness Could Be Del Toro’s Horror Masterpiece
Originally published in 1936, At the Mountains of Madness concerns an Antarctic expedition that ends in disaster after explorers happen upon a previously unknown mountain range, mysterious ruins and creatures dubbed Elder Things. For his planned adaptation, del Toro wanted to go all-out in depicting the story’s horrors, a plan that would’ve naturally led to the movie being R-rated. Unfortunately, that R-rating was a big reason studios balked at putting up the money for the film (despite Tom Cruise being attached).
Del Toro’s unwillingness to compromise his vision for At the Mountains of Madness may have prevented it from getting made, but it’s also why his fans still yearn for it to happen. Del Toro clearly is a master of the horror genre from movies like The Devil’s Backbone and Pan’s Labyrinth. And his current Netflix anthology show Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities has only further reinforced his reputation as a loving purveyor of all things monstrous. Indeed, it’s hard to imagine a filmmaker better equipped to realize the “unfilmable” aspects of Lovecraft’s original story while still delivering a tale with some humanity. It’s truly awesome to imagine the sights del Toro’s fertile imagination might concoct if someone gave him both the money and free rein to realize his vision for At the Mountains of Madness.
Could Cabinet Of Curiosities Help Sell At The Mountains of Madness?
Cabinet of Curiosities is a hit at Netflix, a major achievement for a show that lives largely in the Lovecraftian/weird horror genre. But will a studio look at the show’s success and now be more willing to greenlight At the Mountains of Madness? The dream obviously is for the movie to play on the big screen, giving fans a truly huge dose of Lovecraftian madness. But a streaming version would still be satisfying, given del Toro’s talent for bringing unimaginable monsters to life.
The roadblocks to getting At the Mountains of Madness made are still there however and still remain the same. Making it with anything less than an R-rating would be pointless, but studios don’t like putting up money for R-rated movies given their diminished box office prospects. And sadly, streamers like Netflix now seem less-willing than they once were to wildly spend money on filmmakers’ passion projects. So it still looks like a long-shot that At the Mountains of Madness will happen.
Source: Guillermo del Toro/Instagram