Rating: 
Summary: An Outstanding Original
Review: Possibly the greatest movie of director John Carpenter's career, "In The Mouth Of Madness" is atmospheric mystery-horror with implications on a vast and even cosmic scale. Sam Neill plays a private investigator hired by a publishing house to find one of their bestselling authors who's suddenly gone missing, and his trail leads to a town that's supposed to exist only in the author's novels. That's really all you need to know going in; saying too much more would give away too much. Just know that this is going to bend all rationality and present seemingly impossible situations in a way that comes out very eerily believable. Masterful work by everybody on both sides of the camera.
Rating: 
Summary: Surprisingly effective horror...
Review: When I started watching this movie, it seemed like it was going to be kind of cheesey. You had lightning flashing all the time for no reason, sometimes the dialog was kind of... obvious ("I'm not insane!"), and in general you could tell that the director bit off more than the budget could chew. Effects varied from very effective to mediocre. And so on.
But like "Prince of Darkness," another Carpenter movie with similar issues, this movie also found some kind of source of primal freakiness, and stuck a fork in it. Sam Neil isn't an actor I particularly like, but I think he did a good job here, moving from a hardy cynic to complete mental bowl of Jell-O. And his co-star, some actress I've never heard of, is an effectively wierd presence. Charlton Heston is good fun in a small role.
This DVD is pretty bare-bones, it does have the Carpenter commentary track, unlike most "Prince of Darkness" versions, and the picture and sound quality are good. But the commentary, to be blunt, really stinks. Unlike his commentaries with Kurt Russel on "Escape from New York," "The Thing," and "Big Trouble in Little China," this one is crushingly boring for the most part. He spends the whole time talking to some guy who worked on the film's lighting about how he shined light on stuff. Yawn.
Overall, in spite of being kind of low-budget this is a good, enjoyably creepy horror film. It has the great virtue of not just being a recycled psycho killer flick, presumably because Carpenter already made arguably the best one anyway in "Halloween." It has some neat twists, and the usual Carpenter black humor sprinkled in here and there. Recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: More like "I wish I hadn't watched it" Madness
Review: This movie must have been made too late in the digestion process, because by the time you are done watching, you are convinced that it was "In the Excrement of Madness". For being made in 1995, the special effects were a joke. I've seen better masks at the drugstore during halloween. The female lead in this movie really "killed" my interest, but to the title's credit, her acting did make me MAD. This had so much potential, but I wish Sutter Cane had written in better actors, special effects and directing.
Rating:
Summary: In the Mouth of Madness (1995)
Review: Another John Carpenter masterpiece! Terror-filled story is about a popular horror novelist who disappears and a special investigator is sent to find out where Sutter Cane is. Along with a sexy companion, the investigator John Trent finds himself in a town filled with evil that is only existent in Cane's books. This is one of my favourite John Carpenter movies alongside THE FOG and HALLOWEEN. His use of atmosphere and imagery are brilliant and work well. The script is twisting and thrilling and packed with suspense. Special effects are also amazing. And last but not least, the performances here are something else, especially by Sam Niel as John Trent. Brilliant, one of Carpenter's best.
Rating:
Summary: scariest movie i have ever seen.... period!
Review: Let me start off by saying that I have seen this movie 7 times and it scares the crap out of me every time I see it. The movie centers around an insurance (...)named John Trent. He is hired by the world's best selling author, Sutter Cane's publishing company to investigate Cane's sudden dissapearance. Trent, who is always looking for a rational explanation, thinks this is a publicity stunt. He picks up some of Cane's books and uses pieces of the covers as puzzle pieces which form New Hampshire. He then notices in all the books they talk about a town called Hobb's End. He and Canes editor go searching for this "fake" town but soon find it much more than fake. I won't give away anything else so go buy the movie, you won't be dissapointed! By the way, is it just me or are the scenes with the kid/old man on the bike quite possibly the scariest scenes ever in a horror movie?
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