When HP Lovecraft sat down at his desk to write his short story From Beyond, did he picture, in his mind’s eye, Ken Foree in his underpants battling a giant worm, Barbara Crampton being attacked by a swarm of carnivorous flies, or Jeffrey Combs ravenously munching on a human brain? It’s fair to assume he probably didn’t, but director Stuart Gordon did and that’s precisely why the 1986 film From Beyond is a deranged, no-holds-barred body horror masterpiece.
Crawford Tillinghast (Combs) is a scientist assisting the work of Dr Pretorius (Ted Sorel) on his invention the Resonator, a classic mad-scientist contraption – complete with tuning forks, static crackle and plasma globes – that allows the user to access another dimension. On the trial run something goes awry: Pretorius is decapitated and Crawford is arrested for murder and gets committed to a psychiatric ward.
