Notes from a second viewing, fifteen years later.
Added 1/27/2010
In the Mouth of Madness (John Carpenter, 1995)
I originally saw In the Mouth of Madness on opening weekend, in the theater, for full price. I hadn't liked a John Carpenter film since They Live, but with the Lovecraft allusions and overtly literary plot, I had to check it out. I was, to say the least, mildly disappointed. For the past fifteen years, though, people I generally trust have been telling me how awesome this movie is, so I decided I'd give it a second shot. And while I liked it better than I remembered it the second time around, I still don't think it's up to the level of Carpenter's earlier movies.
John Trent (Sam Neill) is an insurance investigator, and a very nasty one indeed, as we see in the opening scene. Nasty, yes, but good at his job. Thus, when mega-selling horror writer Sutter Kane (Jurgen Prochnow) goes missing, his publisher, Jackson Harglow (Charlton Heston), hires Trent to go looking for him. With one condition: Trent has to take along Harglow's assistant, Linda Styles (Julie Carmen in her last, to date, major role). Trent becomes convinced that Hobb's End, the fictional town the features in many of Kane's books, is a real place somewhere in rural New Hampshire, and he and Styles set off to find it. They do, but they find out it's a very, very weird place...
There's always been an element of cheesiness to John Carpenter's special effects; think about the whirling tube of slime in Prince of Darkness, for example. (Hell, his most famous creation is a big guy in a sheet and a William Shatner mask.) But there's a fine line between judicious use of cheese and going over the top. The climax of this movie hits all the highs of the latter, with the added problem that the effects used in most of those scenes scraped the bottom of the budget barrel. You can see where they'd probably be cool with more money, or better technology, or maybe a better cinematographer (imagine what Nicholas Musuraca, from the Val Lewton stable, would've done with it). But that's not what we got. As well, the over-the-top-ness, for lack of a better term, of Carpenter's characterization grates here. It sometimes does in earlier films as well (I still make an I'm-sucking-on-a-lemon face during the opening of Prince of Darkness, when Jameson Parker and Lisa Blount go from introduction to bed in about thirty seconds of screen time), but it's all about Sam Neill's overacting. Since he's the main character here, you can see where that might be a problem. I understand the role was written that way; that makes it no less annoying.
Still, I can't hate the movie. Lovecraft references abound, and the concept of the thing is so startling. There are subtle touches that evoke the artistry Carpenter showed on earlier movies ("Did I ever tell you my favorite color is blue?" doesn't have quite the impact until you've seen the movie multiple times and picked up on one of those subtleties). And Carpenter's intent here was to make a B movie, more so than it was with earlier projects. And so I'm still of two minds; it's watchable, but it's not up to Carpenter standards. ** ½
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Lovecraft Still Can Work
Added 9/15/2009
Right away it was obviously a lovecraft/poe rip off. But it seemed to work in typical John Carpenter style. For those of you familiar with John Carpenter this will be a great description as it is a better carpenter than not. Enjoy!
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Huge Disappointment
Added 8/28/2009
I will never forget this film nor forgive the film's advertising for leading me on. Both the title and the add campaign seemed to point to this film being the end-product of an interesting cycle. The cycle began with H.P. Lovecraft's novella "At The Mountains of Madness" which he himself considered to be his favorite thing he ever wrote. In 1949, inspired by Lovecraft's tale, James Campbell wrote the story "Who Goes There" which was turned into the famous 1951 Oscar winning horror film "The Thing". In the 1980s, John Carpenter executed his fantastic remake of "The Thing" in which the monster is more closely related both the the Chameleon of "Who Goes There?" and Lovecraft's amorphous Shoggoths. From the name of the film and the scene in the coming attraction which was identical to one in "At The Mountains of Madness", I thought the film "In The Mouth of Madness" would depict the tale which started the whole cycle. Instead, the story was as un-Lovecraftian as you could want. Take my advice and give this one a miss unless you want to see another Stephen King or Dean Koontz bloodbath.
The story follows an author who suddenly finds himself in the horror world of his own fiction. It turns out that his villain has used the books to invoke a kind of limbo reality and is attempting to trade places with his creator. He is also using the author's books to cause readers to turn into psychotic zombies. In the end, the author is locked up in a sanitarium where he becomes the only person in the world to survive a worldwide outbreak of killer zombies "from hell".
The libral use of Lovecraftian names (There is a Pickman House B&B) only makes the film more painful to watch if you are a dedicated Lovecraftian. Again the tale is more of shock and awe horror which pours so prolifically from the pen of the likes of Stephen King (of course if you like Stephen King, this film is definitely up your alley). I should note that I like Stephen King's earlier works which were more like, but not direct copies of, the Lovecraftian circle ( the anthologies "Night Shift" and "Skeleton Crew", in my opinion, contain his best work). They relied less on gore and foul language (though it was always there) and more on the creation of an atmosphere of real horror.
This film also sealed my opinion that John Carpenter has lost his ability to make a decent horror film. The last of his films that I liked was "Prince of Darkness" but even that was not as good as his classics like "Escape From New York", "The Thing" or "Big Trouble In Little China". I also resented his comments in an early interview on the Sci Fi Channel in which he blamed us, the fans, for the lack of good horror films at the time.
2 out of 5 people found this helpful.
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Part 3 of John Carpenter's "Apocalypse Trilogy"
Added 8/25/2009
According to John Carpenter, "In the Mouth of Madness" is the capstone of his "Apocalypse Trilogy" - Part 1 begun in 1981 with his masterful reinvention of 50's B horror classic "The Thing," where a long-frozen, world-conquering alien "force" is unthawed in Antarctica, with potentially global-annihilative results.
Part 2 according to Carpenter came six years later, with his "heady, post-graduate-minded Einsteinian horror classic," - PRINCE OF DARKNESS, a wonderfully inventive, thoughtful, if not entirely "logical" (well, isn't that the point of the "horror" genre anyway? "Abandon all logic, all haven, all hope for salvation ... Ye who [foolishly] enter here!"). In "Prince," Carpenter once again designs a "modern" world, not unlike "The Thing," only set in sunny, mostly upscale California, with a team of university physicists, radiologists, mathematicians, linguistics scholars, philosophers and a priest (underplayed brilliantly, as usual, by the incomparable, late Donald Pleasance) - pitted against a "secret which can no longer be kept" - namely, "Satan's son," trapped for over 7 million years inside of a weird, metallic cistern, which, creepily enough, "can only be opened from the inside." Triggered by a super nova perhaps (we're never entirely sure), Satan's son, having been buried in the Middle East long ago after his father was somehow, "banished to the darkside," is now awakening, and proceeds to slice, dice, and "water gun" its way through the team of stalwart scientists. Here again we see shades of "The Thing," with the scientists on the short end of the "magic wand" to repel it.
Now enter Part 3 - "In the Mouth of Madness" - the FINALE! Because the end is TRULY nigh. Whereas in parts 1 and 2, the "unspeakable beast" only wreaked "local havoc" (with major caveats), NOW we are, as a race - WHOLLY DAMNED!! And Carpenter makes no ambiguity of our fate. As John Trent (Sam Neill) muses ruefully from the sanctum of his padded cell to his pychiatrist (David Warner): "Every species can smell its own extinction. The last ones left won't have a pretty time of it. In ten years, maybe less, humanity will be nothing more than a bedtime story to 'them,' a myth they tell to their children..."
"ITMOM" is a difficult film in that so much of it is ... ostensibly random, "diaboli dictu;" many of the scenes underline incredulity, and the plot is ostensibly, almost irrelevant. What IS relevant is that the world is going to hell, and everyone who reads "Sutter Cane" (a not-so-subtle play on "Stephen King") SPEEDS along the return of "nameless, shambling things; The Old Ones" ala H.P. Lovecraft.
Carpenter piles on "the works" without worry of logic or storytelling coherence, because - as we're told - "reality isn't what it used to be anymore." It sure isn't. As Trent is on a bus back to Manhattan, Sutter Cane mysteriously appears in the seat next to him, and - because Cane is "God" now (self prescribed) - it is axiomatic that he can do anything. So he says to Trent, "Did I ever tell you that my favorite color is blue?" Cut to the next scene, where Trent wakes up, and the entire bus and passengers are gelled in a blue filter. Naturally, Trent screams and is awakened by his fellow passengers, who try to comfort him, "Hey mister, it's okay. You just had a bad dream."
Lots of clever tropes infuse "Madness" throughout, although this 3rd installment, by DESIGN, is THE LEAST easy to take of the 3 "apocalypses." Nevertheless, the brilliance of Sam Neill (remember him as grownup Damien from "Omen 3?") more than carries this finale. In fact, "In the Mouth of Madness," or so I have discovered for my own viewing purposes, has a FAR GREATER appeal to me NOW, on DVD, than when I first saw this film back in 1993 at the Theatre. Dark spirits only know why?
But it can't be coincidence that Carpenter laid out his trilogy - very numerologically NEATLY so. Every film, from "The Thing" to "Madness," was made 6 years apart (1981, 1987, 1993) - 666! Or, more correctly, 66... unless Carpenter's oevre up until "The Thing" might be considered his "first 6." Another trope. Another mystery. Another thing to make us go, "hmmmmmm ...".
But to be certain, as Sutter Cane (well rendered by Jurgen Prochnow) tells Trent, "My first books were something. But this next one is going to drive the whole world ABSOLUTELY MAD!" And the addition of late cinematic maven Charlton Heston as Arcane Publisher Jason Harglow, is revealing. Remember Heston's earlier career when he was in such apocalyptic roles as "The Planet of the Apes" could inspire? Coincidence here? In Carpenter's able horror-craft hands, we would do well not to question "The Master."
This one is for PURE HORROR ENJOYMENT strictly! Abandon ALL logic. The scientists and wonks from Parts 1 and 2 are probably all dead by now anyway. "Do YOU read Sutter Cane?"
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In the Mouth of Badness
Added 7/20/2009
The 1990's brought about one of John Carpenter's attempts to return to horror with "In the Mouth of Madness", a supernatural fantasy movie that aims to shock the viewer on a psychological level. If this movie gave you chills, turn down your air conditioner.
In the Mouth of Madness tells the tale of an insurance fraud investigator who is hired by a publishing company to find a missing horror author, Sutter Cane. In his search, he is ultimately lead to a fictional town in which his surroundings are dictated by Sutter Cane's writings.
A number of previous reviewers have really hit the nail on the head here, In the Mouth of Madness is very much like an extended episode of the Twilight Zone. As a matter of fact, there was indeed a first season episode of the Twilight Zone entitled "A World all His Own" in which a writer's works materialized into reality, although rest assured there was more entertainment in that twenty minute episode than there is to be had in this entire ninety minute ordeal.
In the Mouth of Madness just isn't memorable. The storyline seems interesting at a glance, but on the screen it is often confusing and is unable to maintain a consistent level of excitement. At the very least, this is a great example of why good acting alone is rarely enough to make a movie work. And to think this is from the same guy who gave us timeless classics like Halloween, The Thing, and to a lesser degree The Fog? Jeez, and people say Tobe Hooper turned into a hack job.
2 out of 2 people found this helpful.
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Notes from a second viewing, fifteen years later.
Added 1/27/2010
In the Mouth of Madness (John Carpenter, 1995)
I originally saw In the Mouth of Madness on opening weekend, in the theater, for full price. I hadn't liked a John Carpenter film since They Live, but with the Lovecraft allusions and overtly literary plot, I had to check it out. I was, to say the least, mildly disappointed. For the past fifteen years, though, people I generally trust have been telling me how awesome this movie is, so I decided I'd give it a second shot. And while I liked it better than I remembered it the second time around, I still don't think it's up to the level of Carpenter's earlier movies.
John Trent (Sam Neill) is an insurance investigator, and a very nasty one indeed, as we see in the opening scene. Nasty, yes, but good at his job. Thus, when mega-selling horror writer Sutter Kane (Jurgen Prochnow) goes missing, his publisher, Jackson Harglow (Charlton Heston), hires Trent to go looking for him. With one condition: Trent has to take along Harglow's assistant, Linda Styles (Julie Carmen in her last, to date, major role). Trent becomes convinced that Hobb's End, the fictional town the features in many of Kane's books, is a real place somewhere in rural New Hampshire, and he and Styles set off to find it. They do, but they find out it's a very, very weird place...
There's always been an element of cheesiness to John Carpenter's special effects; think about the whirling tube of slime in Prince of Darkness, for example. (Hell, his most famous creation is a big guy in a sheet and a William Shatner mask.) But there's a fine line between judicious use of cheese and going over the top. The climax of this movie hits all the highs of the latter, with the added problem that the effects used in most of those scenes scraped the bottom of the budget barrel. You can see where they'd probably be cool with more money, or better technology, or maybe a better cinematographer (imagine what Nicholas Musuraca, from the Val Lewton stable, would've done with it). But that's not what we got. As well, the over-the-top-ness, for lack of a better term, of Carpenter's characterization grates here. It sometimes does in earlier films as well (I still make an I'm-sucking-on-a-lemon face during the opening of Prince of Darkness, when Jameson Parker and Lisa Blount go from introduction to bed in about thirty seconds of screen time), but it's all about Sam Neill's overacting. Since he's the main character here, you can see where that might be a problem. I understand the role was written that way; that makes it no less annoying.
Still, I can't hate the movie. Lovecraft references abound, and the concept of the thing is so startling. There are subtle touches that evoke the artistry Carpenter showed on earlier movies ("Did I ever tell you my favorite color is blue?" doesn't have quite the impact until you've seen the movie multiple times and picked up on one of those subtleties). And Carpenter's intent here was to make a B movie, more so than it was with earlier projects. And so I'm still of two minds; it's watchable, but it's not up to Carpenter standards. ** ½
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Lovecraft Still Can Work
Added 9/15/2009
Right away it was obviously a lovecraft/poe rip off. But it seemed to work in typical John Carpenter style. For those of you familiar with John Carpenter this will be a great description as it is a better carpenter than not. Enjoy!
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Huge Disappointment
Added 8/28/2009
I will never forget this film nor forgive the film's advertising for leading me on. Both the title and the add campaign seemed to point to this film being the end-product of an interesting cycle. The cycle began with H.P. Lovecraft's novella "At The Mountains of Madness" which he himself considered to be his favorite thing he ever wrote. In 1949, inspired by Lovecraft's tale, James Campbell wrote the story "Who Goes There" which was turned into the famous 1951 Oscar winning horror film "The Thing". In the 1980s, John Carpenter executed his fantastic remake of "The Thing" in which the monster is more closely related both the the Chameleon of "Who Goes There?" and Lovecraft's amorphous Shoggoths. From the name of the film and the scene in the coming attraction which was identical to one in "At The Mountains of Madness", I thought the film "In The Mouth of Madness" would depict the tale which started the whole cycle. Instead, the story was as un-Lovecraftian as you could want. Take my advice and give this one a miss unless you want to see another Stephen King or Dean Koontz bloodbath.
The story follows an author who suddenly finds himself in the horror world of his own fiction. It turns out that his villain has used the books to invoke a kind of limbo reality and is attempting to trade places with his creator. He is also using the author's books to cause readers to turn into psychotic zombies. In the end, the author is locked up in a sanitarium where he becomes the only person in the world to survive a worldwide outbreak of killer zombies "from hell".
The libral use of Lovecraftian names (There is a Pickman House B&B) only makes the film more painful to watch if you are a dedicated Lovecraftian. Again the tale is more of shock and awe horror which pours so prolifically from the pen of the likes of Stephen King (of course if you like Stephen King, this film is definitely up your alley). I should note that I like Stephen King's earlier works which were more like, but not direct copies of, the Lovecraftian circle ( the anthologies "Night Shift" and "Skeleton Crew", in my opinion, contain his best work). They relied less on gore and foul language (though it was always there) and more on the creation of an atmosphere of real horror.
This film also sealed my opinion that John Carpenter has lost his ability to make a decent horror film. The last of his films that I liked was "Prince of Darkness" but even that was not as good as his classics like "Escape From New York", "The Thing" or "Big Trouble In Little China". I also resented his comments in an early interview on the Sci Fi Channel in which he blamed us, the fans, for the lack of good horror films at the time.
2 out of 5 people found this helpful.
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