This movie feels like a mash-up of Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft, although not quite achieving either one. I suppose
that makes sense since it's John Carpenter's homage to both of them. And of course since this is a John Carpenter film, you can
be rest assured that it has all the elements of a classic camp horror film while staying just this side of pedestrian. Oh, and
there are lots of tentacles as well -- another John Carpenter "must."
John Carpenter is one of those directors where his
movies are (in my opinion) a hit or a miss without much in between.
While he may have tons of devoted fans out there, some of his films are,
frankly, crap. He does have a couple of good ones out there,
but I generally think of him along the same vein as Ed Wood: his films
have an element of "bad" that makes them fun to watch. That
having been said, I did enjoy In the Mouth of Madness on its own merits (I didn't know it was a Carpenter film until after
I watched it).
Sam Neil does a fantastic job with his role; his slow
spiral into madness is compelling and
almost as disorienting for the viewer as it is for his character... but
in a good way. This film definitely has a Stephen King feel
to it, albeit with a LOT of references to the Lovecraft mythos. There
is a strange disjointed feel to the storytelling element that
is a lot like a King flick (and his novels). You never quite
know what's going on, and just about anything can happen because
there are no rules as to how the world works. And just when you think
you've figured it all out, a tentacled beast jumps out of the
closet, or your bowl of Cheerios tries to eat YOU for breakfast. It is
an intriguing movie that can really be summed up by a scene
very early in. When Neil's character is familiarizing himself with the
mysterious writer, Sutter Cain, he slips into a bizarre (and
fairly menacing) day dream... which turns out to be within another
dream... and another, until you can never quite be sure
when he's actually awake and when the strange things going on around him
are really occurring. Wait... isn't that one of the driving
plot elements to Inception? Hmmm...
Anyway, while this isn't one of the greatest movies ever made, and is really a non-traditional Carpenter flick in many
respects, it is still worth a watch. This is definitely a creepy little jaunt down the rabbit hole...
Movie to Skip: Bear
There really aren't a lot of redeeming qualities about
this film. It isn't scary, the main plot is sheer nonsense, and
there is simply nothing interesting about the underlying "twist." I
mean, is this a movie about a renegade man-eating bear, or some
kind of twisted redemption story? I don't think the writer knew when he
sat down to pen it, and I'm damn sure I don't know now that
I've seen it. Sadly, the "twist" adds nothing to this story, as you
have already written off all of the characters as too stupid to
justify surviving the film by the time the movie bothers to get to it.
In fact, I really started questioning the worth of all of these
idiots after it took them a half a day to change a friggin' tire. Talk
about a car full of dim bulbs...
This is a waste of film. Skip it.
