Let’s take a look at the film's mayhem level:

• A man shotguns himself in the head.
• A woman contorts her body into a walking spider-like creature.
• The children of a small town mutate into little monsters.
• A man goes crazy in a downtown metropolitan area and stars swinging away with an ax.
• An old lady transforms into a tentacled creature and chops her husband into pieces.
• A battalion of monsters chases after their terrified victim.

There is a lot more to the film than the description above, but many of you may not have seen it before, so we don’t want to ruin all the twists of the script. If you are a first timer, Hopefully your curiosity is piqued to check out IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS, and you’ll still find a lot of surprises. Though the film is far from perfect, it rises far above the teen SCREAM-type horror, and provides some original concepts (though it does contain it’s share of clichés). There are not even any teenagers in the movie, which makes it a better movie in my opinion.

John Carpenter masterfully milks the premise for every bit of suspense and scares that he can muster. If anything, IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS suffers from clichés, including that old staple, the dream-within-a-dream sequence, which Carpenter does more than once. This movie is from New Line, where Freddy Krueger is always in their subconscience—and scripter Joe Deluca wrote FREDDY’S DEAD, so that probably explains why. But the film is a two-tiered affair: one part visceral shocker, and one part psychological thriller. The visceral shocker part did not work for me, but the psychological element had me glued, as we explored Trent’s descent into madness.

The movie unravels through the eyes of John Trent, a well-defined character. When the movie begins, he is a stoic doubting-Thomas type, but by the time he reaches the fictional town of Hobbes End, Trent starts questioning his own sanity. Through the rest of the film, the audience is taken down the path of despair, paranoia, and schizophrenia, until we come to realize perhaps Trent is not crazy after all.

The acting by the most of the principals and the bit players is great. I already mentioned Sam Neill’s decent performance; but also, Jurgen Prochnow gets the best dialog. Too bad his role is not bigger. The bit players including Charlton Heston, David Warner, John Glover, and Frances Bay are good. Only lead actress Julie Carmen is flat, and not deserving of the role.

One of the great ideas of the story line is the inclusion of the horror fiction angle, and the fanatical followings which echo real-life literary icons. We get a glimpse of the shady publishing industry, who are really uncaring towards their meal tickets, as long as the writers produce. As you would imagine, there is a lot of in-jokes about the horror fiction industry, and the film portrays rabid consumers in a negative light. Another interesting point about the horror fiction angle, is that Sutter Cane’s combined literary works become the viewers reality. This provides some thought-provoking mythological undercurrents to supplement the psychological element.

The Lovecraftian lore is successfully utilized, though significantly underplayed. Even Lovecraft fans will be looking for more answers. As the world begins to crumble thanks to the arrival of the dark gods, no explanation is given. The film provides us glimpses of Lovecraft-inspired tentacled monsters (which are impressively executed), but these creatures provide no sense of fear or shed any light on the menace.

The numerous make up effects are by K.N.B. Effects (consisting of makeup veterans Robert Kurtzman, Howard Berger, Greg Nicotero). ILM is responsible for the tentacled monsters and reality warping visuals. All the makeup and special effects are state-of-the-art. For a medium budget movie, Carpenter really manages to give IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS a slick, big-budget look. However, I cant help but wonder that the film may have benefited from a less-polished, more atmospheric look. The final apocalyptic scenes look great however.

SIGHT

New Line produces another excellent 16x9 enhanced widescreen (2:35:1) transfer. This transfer is struck from a high definition master, and with the exception of a few instances of grain and specs, is pristine. The image is very crisp and well defined. Color reproduction is vivid and without bleeding, chroma noise, or compression artifacts. Especially noticeable is the perfectly calibrated blacker-than-black level. There is a lot of blood flow in this film, and the transfer makes it all the more horrifying. The contrast level is incredible and the small town scenery of Hobbes End is full of atmosphere and detail. The films lighting is a bit on the bright side, which gives the interiors a bright, washed out look, to contrast the dark exteriors. This is intentional on the part of the filmmakers and not the fault of New Line’s mastering. The special effects scenes for the most part are impressive, and look great in the transfer, with lots of slimy detail. These scenes are not glimpsed for too long. You can also select a full frame version from the main menu, but why would you want to do that? Every studio should take lessons from New Line on how to release catalog titles on DVD!

SOUND

This is a decent, loud, DD 5.1 Surround soundtrack. In a nutshell, the mix is high on ambiance, but lacks constant panning and directional effects. When the action calls for it, the sound field comes to loud life; but it is usually to reinforce a cheap scare tactic. The front soundstage acts as an anchor, with the right/left panning providing some great stereo separation. The rear soundstage gets the least activity, but when it does it is crisp and powerful. Also the rears provide a lot of atmosphere and even the score sounds great. The bass is powerful at times, and subtle when bass effects are not needed. One problem I noticed was that the dialog emanating from the center channel is a bit harsh. The dialog, the sound effects, and the music do not sound %100 synchronized. The overall sound field presentation is thrilling, with lots of creepy haunted house style sound effects mixing with standard Hollywood loudness. IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS opens with a heavy metal soundtrack and closes with the same music. But the music itself sounds like a rip-off of Metallica’s Enter Sandman. This music sucks, but has good fidelity. John Carpenter composed some traditional scoring for the movie, and it is much better. Though not perfect, another strong job by New Line.

FEATURES

The talent bios are for Sam Neill, Julie Carmen, Jurgen Prochnow, John Glover, Charlton Heston, and John Carpenter. The awesome theatrical trailer is widescreen, DD 5.1, and runs 1:49. There is an audio commentary with director John Carpenter and Director of Photography Gary Kibbe, and unfortunately, the focus of the commentary is on the technical end and lighting considerations. Because the film leaves so many unanswered questions, I was hoping for an insightful commentary that would provide details of the film’s mythology. But there is no insight provided by the commentary. Definitely not one of Carpenters better commentaries. If you are a Carpenter fan who buys DVDs because of his commentaries, save your pennies.

CONCLUSION

                                               Rating (out of 5):