From Beyond (Terror from the Unknown)
Directed by Stuart Gordon
USA 1986
Plot
Doctors Pretorius and Tillinghast work on stimulating the pineal gland to open the third eye, a function of the mind capable of reaching higher dimensions. The team successfully completes the experiment but also opens a portal that brings terrifying life forms to Earth.
Considerations
A powerful film directed by Stuart Gordon and co-written with his friend Brian Yuzna, From Beyond is the cinematic adaptation of the 1920 story by H.P. Lovecraft.
Produced on a low budget in Italy with the assistance of an Italian crew, it remains a successful and ambitious project even today: a masterful combination of atmosphere and highly effective special effects.
Gordon, along with Yuzna, can rightfully be considered one of the best cinematic interpreters of Lovecraft’s universe. After the splendid Re-Animator from the previous year, he reaffirms all his good intentions with From Beyond, adding new elements to a formula that works and which he would continue to refine throughout his career.
The film is extremely splatter and gore, with a strong sci-fi foundation but heavily leaning into body horror, featuring terrifying solutions where all the protagonists are sucked into a spiral that warps their psychology: Dr. Pretorius transforms from a scholar and researcher into a monstrous creature with godlike delusions, while Dr. McMichaels descends from a serious academic into extreme sexual and bondage madness.
The irony that permeated the previous Re-Animator almost entirely disappears, replaced by a tense and deliberately disorienting mood (much like the subject matter written by Lovecraft).
The characters are all well-portrayed and deeply immersed in their roles: Jeffrey Combs returns to the cast after his excellent performance as Herbert West in the previous film, and Ken Foree is also present, a horror icon known and loved for his role in Romero’s Dawn of the Dead.
The soundtrack, composed by Richard Band, was awarded at the Sitges Festival in Spain.
From Beyond was a major success and solidified Gordon’s status as a director, earning him an immediate assignment for another film (Dolls). His style, combining sci-fi, body horror, and a touch of irony, gained followers over the years, becoming a recognizable trademark. Cult films like Dagon (also directed by Gordon) and Hellraiser, as well as more recent films with the same DNA (Slither and The Void), owe much to his cinema and the world he created.
The film is available on Prime Video.
Pandemonium Moment
The scene where Dr. Tillinghast, now completely enslaved by his pineal gland, attacks a nurse and sucks her brain directly from her eye socket after biting out her eye.
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