Necronomicon

A three-part portmanteau movie based on tales by the horror author HP Lovecraft. With its fluid camera style and lush score, French director Gans' 'The Drowned' is the most stylish segment, in which the inheritor of a 1920s cliff-top hotel, Payne, tries to resurrect his dead girlfriend. Gans' sure build-up emphasises atmosphere and character rather than effects, but the gloopy finale certainly makes up for it. By contrast, Japanese film-maker Kaneko's 'The Cold' is a torpid affair in which mad doctor Warner uses his victims' spinal fluid to sustain eternal life. Capping things off nicely is Society director Yuzna's 'Whispers', which makes a bloody spurt for the gorier end of the horror picture spectrum. Having pursued the furtive driver of a speeding car into a subterranean world, a male and female cop are lured to their fate by a sly old bum and his blind, religious-fanatic wife, who feed them to some flying flesh-eaters. While neither as subtle or stylish as Gans' segment, this certainly delivers old-fashioned gore-a-plenty. (Yuzna also directs a wrap-around segement, 'The Library', in which Lovecraft consults the Necronomicon, a book containing the secrets of the universe.