In the Mouth of Madness (1995) New Line/Horror RT: 95 minutes Rated R (images of horror, language) Director: John Carpenter Screenplay: Michael De Luca Music: John Carpenter and Jim Lang Cinematography: Gary B. Kibbe Release date: February 3, 1995 (US) Cast: Sam Neill, Julie Carmen, Jurgen Prochnow, David Warner, John Glover, Bernie Casey, Peter Jason, Charlton Heston, Frances Bay, Wilhelm von Homburg, Kevin Rushton, Gene Mack, Conrad Bergschneider. Box Office: $8.9M (US)
Rating: *** ½
I used to dismiss John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness as one of his lesser works. I’ve since changed my position on that. What I wasn’t aware of until recently is that it’s the final part of a trilogy, Carpenter’s “Apocalypse Trilogy” to be exact. It follows The Thing and Prince of Darkness, two of the horror auteur’s very best. I remember being utterly baffled by it when I saw it at the movies. I tried watching it a second time a week later on a bootleg videotape of surprisingly good quality to the same effect. After that, I gave up on it and didn’t attempt a full rewatch until this past week. What a difference a quarter century makes. I finally get it and now I think it’s positively brilliant.
I should really start by saying In the Mouth of Madness is totally and completely bonkers! How else would you describe a tale told by a patient at a mental hospital? The patient in question is John Trent (Neill, The Final Conflict), a freelance insurance investigator who’s hired by a New York publishing company to find their biggest client, popular horror author Sutter Cane (Prochnow, The Keep). It seems he’s gone missing without turning over the manuscript to his latest novel entitled “In the Mouth of Madness”. It’s explained by editor Linda Styles (Carmen, Fright Night Part 2) that Cane’s books have a strange effect on “less stable readers”. Namely, it drives them insane. That’s certainly true of the crazed, axe-wielding lunatic that goes after Trent at a restaurant. He turns out to be Cane’s agent, btw.
Initially, Trent believes Cane’s disappearance to be a publicity stunt engineered by the publishing company. However, he’s intrigued. He buys a few of his books at notices red lines on the cover. When he puts them together, they point to the supposedly fictional city of Hobb’s End, the setting for many of Cane’s stories. He decides to look for it. He’s joined by Styles at the behest of her boss Jackson Harglow (Heston, Planet of the Apes). It’s a strange trip to say the least, but things get really weird once they arrive in Hobb’s End where they eventually find Cane alive and well and plotting to bring about the end of humanity.
Although In the Mouth of Madness has been lurking in the shadows for over 25 years, I’m loath to reveal what Trent finds out once he arrives at his destination and takes in his strange, surreal surroundings. I’ll only say it puts a crazy slant on the proceedings. That should actually be crazier. In any event, Trent ends up in a padded room telling his wild story to a psychiatrist (Warner, The Omen).
Horror fans will note a couple of things about In the Mouth of Madness. Namely, it makes allusions to popular horror writers H.P. Lovecraft and Stephen King. The title is a play on Lovecraft’s “At the Mountains of Madness”. The idea of the story being told in flashback form by a patient in an asylum is a common technique of Lovecraft. Cane setting his books in a fictional New England town is a direct reference to King setting many of his stories in Castle Rock, ME.
That it took a few viewings to understand In the Mouth of Madness speaks to the convoluted nature of Michael De Luca’s (Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare) screenplay. It is confusing, especially in the middle section. It’s herein the movie’s brilliance lies. Once you put it all together, it’s pretty cool. It’s freaky too. When you think about it, In the Mouth of Madness isn’t a mainstream horror movie at all. It’s a total mind f*** movie! I get why it failed at the box office. It’s too arty for mass consumption. It fits in better with indie horror films (e.g. Nadja, Dead Alive) than the likes of Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers. I’d even say it was ahead of its time. I think it would be better received today.
When In the Mouth of Madness hit theaters, it had been seven years since Carpenter made a good horror movie, 1988’s They Live, a satirical sci-fi piece about the frightening cause of modern society’s ills. In between, he made the lame Chevy Chase comedy Memoirs of an Invisible Man. In the Mouth of Madness is a return to form for the director who redefined the horror genre with the 1978 classic Halloween. One of Carpenter’s greatest strengths as a filmmaker is his willingness to take chances. Sometimes they pay off and sometimes they don’t. I am now of the opinion that In the Mouth of Madness is a case of the former rather than the latter. He deliberately chooses NOT to manufacture a generic scary movie that checks all the boxes. Instead, he does something wholly original and genuinely frightening in exploring the line between reality and fiction.
The acting is another strong point. Neill is very good as Trent, a rational type who starts to unravel as he questions reality and his own existence. You really believe he’s going mad. Prochnow hams it up mightily as Sutter Cane, a writer who might create more than words on a page. Carmen has some good scenes as Styles, a refreshing change in that she doesn’t become Trent’s love interest or sexual partner. The cast also includes Bernie Casey (Dr. Black and Mr. Hyde), John Glover (52 Pick-Up), Frances Bay (Happy Gilmore) and Carpenter regular Peter Jason (Prince of Darkness).
In the Mouth of Madness also boasts some great special effects. They’re the combined work of Howard Berger, Robert Kurtzman and Gregory Nicotero, all of whom worked on Wes Craven’s New Nightmare. Okay, I’ll reveal something else. Monsters figure into the story. They’re a mix of animatronics and men in tentacled rubber suits. The wall of monsters, which took over 30 people to operate, is AWESOME! From a purely visual standpoint, In the Mouth of Madness is pretty amazing. It has some truly frightening images like the shot of the axe-wielding maniac approaching the window next to the table where Trent and his lunch companion are sitting completely oblivious to the bedlam outside. The score by Carpenter and Jim Lang is good, but not as memorable as that of other Carpenter scores.
What ultimately makes In the Mouth of Madness so effective is that it’s intended only to frighten the viewer which it does. It frightens on both a physical and visceral level. Carpenter comes up with legitimately scary images and ideas. It’s a very cerebral scary movie. You have to think about it. At the same time, it freaks you out with shots of a lone bicyclist riding along a dark highway. I never realized how remarkable it is until now. The final shot is one that will stay with you. If I may return to the vernacular of my teen years, In the Mouth of Madness is one f***ed up movie! I LOVE IT!
