À Beira da Loucura

Insurance claims expert John Trent (Sam Neill) Goes off on a search for missing horror author Sutter Cane (Jürgen Prochnow), convinced his disappearance is a hoax. Once Trent goes looking for the missing author, he's lead to Hobb's End, a supposedly fictional New England town, to discover that something very wrong is going on…and Sutter Cane is responsible. "In the Mouth of Madness" came as a delightful surprise to me.

I rented the DVD solely because I'd been wandering the video store shelves for close to 45 minutes (I have a little too much free time) and figured I'd be kicked out so I grabbed a handful of movies. This was one of them, and let me tell you I'm sure glad I did, because this is a damn fine flick!

To start, Sam Neill is excellent, as is Mr. Prochnow. The only bad performer here is Julie Carmen (Regina from Fright Night 2), who gives a wooden and thoroughly unconvincing "when-the-hell-do-I-get-my-paycheck?" performance.

Michael De Luca's script is sharp enough to never takes itself too seriously, while at the same time it can be very scary and dark. John Carpenter's direction was top-notch. Some of the guy's recent films have been…disappointing, to say the least, but here he delivers the gore, suspense and action like a pro.

The special effects are great. The boys over at KNB effects studios cook up lots of monsters, gore and slime, delivering the goods as usual. The creatures here are indeed reminiscent of Carpenter's "The Thing", their creative and all look very lovecraftian in design.

At times the film can be extremely scary. The old trick of using darkness and shadows to convey creepiness that Carpenter's so good at are present and good as ever.

"In the mouth of madness" pulled all the right strings and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Highly recommended.

8/10.

Oh, and great ending.

As someone who has read all of Lovecrafts books I can assure you that this movie has a strong Lovecraftian vibe to it. And even the title seems to be some sort of homage to Lovecrafts work, I presume (In the mouth of madness -> Innsmouth ?) Or maybe I'm just over-interpreting things. Who knows?

With that being said I really enjoyed the movie. It was refreshing and different. Sometimes the prospect of "not knowing what's real or not" is even scarier than straight up gore or monsters. After all the fear of the unknown is the ultimate essence of true horror. This movie had plenty of it so I can't complain.

This film is by far one of the best horror movies I've watched in a couple of months, and I watched a lot. This film succeeds in suspense and thrills, I actually jumped a couple of times. The plot was really good, there was an in-pending sense of doom.

The film moved along fast, and I wished it was a little longer, I didn't want it to end. Sam Neil is the most notable character, and I enjoy most of his work. The rest of the cast didn't have much to do. I loved the inclusion of monsters, even if they had a small part.

I think this film is severely underrated, and deserves a bigger fan base. Check this film out, it's worth your time and money.

What a treat of a film this was. It is witty, intelligent, and scary. The basic plot premise is anything but basic as the line between reality and fantasy is almost indistinguishable through most of the film. What is going on? Who really knows...I'm not sure even director John Carpenter knows. But what we do get is a guessing game of what is real and un-real in a very stylish, sophisticated, almost bizarre fashion. The film opens in a mental asylum with protagonist Sam Neill being put in a padded cell whilst in a straight-jacket. The setting is larger than life. The characters around Neill are caricatures for the most part. John Glover plays a doctor(Doctor Saperstein...a possible homage to Rosemary's Baby) with complete camp. David Warner, another doctor, begins talking to Neill and asking him about what happened. The rest of the film then details what Neill did working with regards to a lost author named Sutter Cane. The plot is much more complicated than that and may take subsequent viewings to fully understand WHAT can be understood. The end result is at the very least a very gratifying one as Carpenter constructs a dream-like story that has obvious roots in both the fiction of H. P. Lovecraft and Stephen King. The acting is good all around...Neill is excellent as John Trent. He makes a very believable presence in a sea of un-reality. Julie Carmen is also very good in her role. Look for Charlton Heston as a publisher and Bernie Casey in a cameo as well. Kudos to Mr. Carpenter for bringing his visions of horror to the silver screen once again. This may be his best film...certainly his most thought-provoking and sophisticated.

I found this film terrifying. Sure there is no man in a stripy jumper coming to 'stab you up' and no one is tied to a chair and worked on with an angle grinder.

This film makes excellent use of those iconic every day objects that become scary in the correct context. (E.G Clowns, mannequins, Victorian prams or a child's ball bouncing down a stair case.) People who have seen this will know what I mean when I say the word bicycle.

Rather than physical peril this film uses assaults on your grasp of reality. mine obviously isn't that great as I find this movie petrifying.

The production of the film isn't great and there are more exciting films out there. But if you have some imagination, are a little romantic and like being scared without having to sit through some poor soul forced to spectate live at their own autopsy, then this deserves every one of its eight stars.