ABSTRACT
Though some technological advances have allowed us to reach corners at the bottom of the ocean in recent decades, we have found them to be dark areas under tons of water where it becomes rather complicated to leave permanent marks of our presence; thus, abyssal depths remain some of the ultimate frontiers for humanity to dominate. On this obscure maritime stage, William Eubank’s film, Underwater (2020) relies on Lovecraftian aquatic monsters to address concerns about the exploitation of nature in the Anthropocene. Eubank’s monsters are inspired by Cthulhu and the Deep Ones, Lovecraft’s underwater entities that emerge from oceanic depths to bring impressions of absolute horror in the short stories “Dagon,” “The Call of Cthulhu,” and “The Shadow over Innsmouth.” The intention of this chapter is to approach Eubank’s film as a Nautical Horror narrative and scrutinize the director’s appropriation of Lovecraftian grotesque monsters to foreground humanity as a species with a very limited role not only in maritime depths but on the whole planet as well. The focus in this chapter centers on the relationship between the Anthropocene and the Nautical Horror perspective leading to a consideration of Lovecraft’s aquatic monsters and their adaptation in Eubank’s film.
