Director – Joe Lynch, Screenplay – Dennis Paoli, Based on the Short Story The Thing on the Doorstep by H.P. Lovecraft, Producers – Barbara Crampton, Bob Portal, Inderpal Singh & Joe Wicker, Photography – David Matthews, Music – Steve Moore, Makeup Effects – Greg McDougall, Production Design – Lily Bolles. Production Company – Alliance Media Partners/Eyevox Entertainment.
Cast
Heather Graham (Dr. Elizabeth Derby), Judah Lewis (Asa Waite), Barbara Crampton (Dr. Daniella Upton), Johnathon Schaech (Edward Derby), Bruce Davison (Ephraim White), Graham Skipper (Pathologist), Brett Newton (Professor Fisk), Chris McKenna (Crawley), J.D. Evermore (Detective Ledger), Giovanne Cruz (Susan), Hunter Womack (Mace, Jr)
Plot
Psychologist Elizabeth Derby has been locked up in a padded cell at the Miskatonic Medical School in Arkham, Massachusetts. Her colleague and good friend Dr Daniella Upton goes to hear the full story. Elizabeth tells how she agreed to see a distressed and fearful young man Asa Waite. As she was talking to him, Asa began to manifest an entirely different personality. Concerned for Asa, Elizabeth went to his home, meeting his elderly and ailing father Ephraim. After Ephraim nicked her with a ritual knife, Elizabeth began to have disturbing experiences where her body was taken over and she was trapped inside Asa’s body. Asa explained that Ephraim was an ancient being who had learned a ritual to swap bodies with another and was seeking to take over his body after Ephraim’s body died. However, Ephraim then became obsessed with taking over Elizabeth’s body.
Joe Lynch has become a regular genre director since the late 2000s. His first film was Wrong Turn 2: Dead End (2007). He followed this with the likes of the Zom-B-Movie segment of the spoof horror anthology Chillerama (2011), the LARPing fantasy Knights of Badassdom (2013) and the action films Everly (2014) and Point Blank (2019). I particularly enjoyed his mass insanity outbreak in an office environment film Mayhem (2017). He has also produced Ghoul (2015) and the tv mini-series 12 Deadly Days (2016).
Suitable Flesh is an adaptation of the H.P. Lovecraft short story The Thing on the Doorstep (1937), which was originally published in Weird Tales magazine. Surprisingly, this is one Lovecraft story I had not read up on for the simple reason that it has never been filmed before and I haven’t needed to check the original out. H.P. Lovecraft on film was popularised by Stuart Gordon’s Re-Animator (1985) and his follow-up From Beyond (1986). Gordon made two other Lovecraft adaptations with Dagon (2001) and the Masters of Horror episode Dreams in the Witch House (2005). While you can argue that Gordon’s splatter-heavy, black comedy approach was the antithesis of Lovecraft’s, it did popularise Lovecraft on film and was followed by a host of other works – see bottom of the page or Lovecraftian Films.
Suitable Flesh is construed as a homage to Stuart Gordon’s Lovecraft adaptations. It stars and is co-produced by Barbara Crampton, who appeared in both Re-Animator and From Beyond and indeed had her career as a cult queen launched on the basis of Re-Animator. Also on board is Dennis Paoli and Brian Yuzna, who respectively wrote the scripts for and produced all of Gordon’s Lovecraft adaptations.
(l to r) Elizabeth Derby (Heather Graham) is visited in a padded ell by Dr. Daniella Upton (Barbara Crampton)
Suitable Flesh is a bodyswap film wherein a person or persons exchange bodies in some ways. I have a more detailed listing of such films here at Bodyswap Films. That said, the majority of bodyswap films are in a light fantasy vein as with examples like Turnabout (1940), Freaky Friday (1976), Like Father, Like Son (1987) and Vice Versa (1988). There have been a number of SF variants with The Hidden (1987) and Possessor (2020), while recent years have led to some horror variants with the likes of Lifechanger (2018), Freaky (2020) and You Won’t Be Alone (2022).
Although there is some initial mystery made about what is happening, it is not terribly difficult to work out what is going on around the time that Judah Lewis changes personalities in Heather Graham’s office. However, from this point on, the film grabs you, in particular with the standout performance given by Judah Lewis in his change between shy innocent teenager and slyly calculating middle-aged man.
The plot plays around with its concepts with an enormous energy, involving a series of whiplash twists back and forward between who is who among the three main cast at any one moment and more crucially who everyone else perceives them to be. There is not quite the gore-drenched ultraviolence of Lynch’s Mayhem but the energy of the plot and performances is up there. It is the most fun to be had in a bodyswap film since Don’t Kill It (2016).
A possessed Heather Graham
The film is well serviced by its cast where all the majors get a great workout. Heather Graham has a good deal of fun between her switch of personalities, while bravely taking on doing nude roles at the age of 53, no less! Barbara Crampton, hailing in at the age of 64 and looking little older then Graham, has an equal amount of fun – none the more so than when the two women go head-to-toe in a catfight in the halls of the asylum.
