YMMV / In the Mouth of Madness

• Alternative Character Interpretation: Obviously with Trent, like if he's a fictional character within another fictional story or just a guy who's mentally insane and little to none of the movie actually happens.
• Critical Dissonance: Critics gave this film an average reception, receiving only 51% on Rotten Tomatoes. Fans and viewers called it Carpenter's best film of The '90s, receiving 73% on the website.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • In this movie, a Stephen King expy reveals that his novels are just him channeling the wishes of an eldritch being. A decade later, the real King wrote himself into his Dark Tower series, claiming that his novels are just him channeling the wishes of an eldritch being. Then again, this might be more of an Homage to this film, since Carpenter and King tend to feed off each other's work.
    • Cane also holds an uncanny physical resemblance to another best-seller author who would become prominent not long after the movie's release.
  • David Warner plays a shrink who evaluates Sam Neill's character, which is interesting considering both actors were part of The Omen trilogy (which like this film also had an apocalypse theme). Ironically, Warner had played the ill-fated photographer and The Lancer Keith Jennings in The Omen (1976), while Neill had played the adult Damien Thorn in The Final Conflict.
  • Both Sam Neill and Peter Jason appear in this film, as both actors are part of the Jurassic Park films, Neill played Dr. Alan Grant in Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III, while Jason appeared in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.
  • This isn't the only time Sam Neill goes insane in a Cosmic Horror Story, either.
  • During an infamous incident in 2017, people actually rioted anticipating the release of a fandom-related product, like in this movie. The product in question wasn't an apocalyptic book or its cinematic adaptation, though: it was packets of Szechuan sauce that McDonald's released to promote Rick and Morty.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • The "Did I ever tell you my favorite color is blue" scene is a minor meme on the net.
  • Trent Laughing Madly while he sits in the theater at the end has also been intercut with different footage online, not unlike the now-infamous "Turn it off!" scene from Hardcore.
    • The Criterion Channel's website's homepage cheekily featured a screenshot from this ending for a chunk of October 2023 when the film was prominently included in a '90s horror retrospective. After all, the streaming service is "A movie lover's dream"!
• Narm:
  • Wilhelm von Homburg's heavy accent and deep, throaty delivery makes his line when he confronts Cane at the church a lot funnier than intended:
  "Junny! Junny bouy!"
  • When Trent punches the possessed Styles, his punches make cartoony sound effects.
  • Stiles shouting "I'm losing me! I'm losing me!"
• Nightmare Retardant: From the scene mentioned under Narm, after Cane appears behind the doors set to a chilling wail in the background, he summons a pack of dobermans to attack the angry mob. That's right, a man with godlike power in service to Eldritch Abominations chooses to summon some decidedly unthreatening attack dogs.
• One-Scene Wonder: Jürgen Prochnow and Charlton Heston, both of whom have only a few minutes of screen time. David Warner and John Glover may also qualify.
• Paranoia Fuel:
  • Your life could be a product of an insane author. The color of your eyes are just his favorite color.
  • The movie adaptation of the Sutter Cane's book that slowly makes you insane and turns you into a monster? You just watched it.
• Retroactive Recognition: The paper boy who Trent meets after he leaves Hobb's End? Yep, that's Hayden Christensen.
• Special Effect Failure:
  • Linda's bloody tears.
  • When Sutter Cane collapses reality, the Great Old Ones appear... as a bunch of obvious rubber costumes.
• Suspiciously Similar Song: It's pretty obvious that John Carpenter wanted to use "Enter Sandman" in the film, because the main theme is about as close as he could get to it without giving Metallica's lawyers a conniption.
• Vindicated by History: As usual with many John Carpenter films, but a longer case than usual. It received mixed reviews at the time of release and was typically associated with John Carpenter’s fall from grace in the nineties. Around the mid-2010’s, however, the film gained an increase in interest and praise for its atmosphere and meta elements, with some going as far as to label it Carpenter’s last great film. This was further bolstered by it receiving a special collecter’s edition Blu-ray in 2018.

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