In The Mouth Of Event Horizon

Combining two different films to make a new viewing experience is nothing new in the fanediting world. We’re not talking using different entries of the same franchise here (ala Jaws 1 and Jaws 2 for example), but actually two entirely different movies. It’s no easy task as more often than not, whilst the final product can be fun and engaging it can suffer from a lack of narrative structure which ultimately makes the experiment an unsuccessful one.

As I approached Rollwave’s intriguing pairing of Paul Anderson’s Event Horizon with John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness, I was therefore hoping this would be one of the few exceptions. I’d already been impressed by the trailer, which showed off some nifty after effects work to replace paintings and posters to help tie the films closer together, so I was pretty excited when I settled down to watch this with the missus.

Firstly, the quality of the picture on show here (I watched the DVD version) is top notch. The film stock used for both films seems similar enough that nothing stands out as odd or ill-fitting, and the audio levels between the footage used is nicely balanced and never draws attention to itself. I did notice a very slight glitch in the picture during the scene where one of Sutter Cane’s disciples (his agent I believe) breaks through the window, but I can’t be sure if this was due to a disc error of some kind, rather than the rendered video file itself. Otherwise, on the technical front this is a great looking and sounding edit.

On the narrative front, I was really impressed with how rollwave combined elements from Event Horizon into the visions which Trent sees during In the Mouth of Madness. Remarkably, by the time the film reaches its conclusion, I was suitably convinced that what I had witnessed was some weird director’s cut of the movie and you can’t really ask for more praise than that. Quite simply, it works.

If there is a slight criticism, I would say it’s the way the edit is presented in its DVD form. No menu of any kind, something which I do feel is important if you’re going to present a DVD version, and secondly having the fanedit credit “directed by John Carpenter and Paul Anderson”, and then leaving the actual film credit of “directed by John Carpenter” is just a little lazy in my opinion. Also, I would have liked some fan-made end credits for a project such as this.

That said, this is still a top notch fanedit and comes highly recommended. I look forward to see
what Rollwave hits us with next.

I'm not the biggest horror buff around, but I do really like In the Mouth of Madness and Event Horizon, so this edit got my interest. I absolutely loved it. The visual editing is just incredible and worth watching for that alone. The audio editing is great, no issues. Picture is perfect. The story works amazingly well. The only issues I had were the inclusion of the In the Mouth of Madness opening credits along with the custom credits. It looks a little odd to have "Directed by John Carpenter and Paul Anderson" followed by "Directed by John Carpenter". And there is a strange edit around 15:45. I know it was a necessary cut, but could have been smoothed out a bit more.

But those are very minor quibbles and this is a great edit. I love seeing this kind of creativity by someone who really has some amazing technical skill. Can't wait to see what RollWave does next.

This Fan edit set up Event Horizon as a sequel to the movie In The Mouth Of Madness, and honestly, any other horror movie with Sam Neill would work here, In order to explain how this works I would have to spoil the movie In The Mouth of Madness, and if you have never seen this movie watch it first (One of my personal favorite), and you will get the picture.

This Fan edit is just a nice idea, it doesn't benefit either Event Horizon or In The Mouth of Madness from a narrative perspective, but it executes the idea well.

One complaint is that the text in the book moves in one of the scenes and it breaks the illusion

The idea of In the Mouth of Event Horizon, I think, sounds good on paper but in practice didn't work as well as I'd hoped. Both films star Sam Neill, and both movies focus on his characters descent into madness, but that's where the similarities end.

It was basically watching In the Mouth of Madness with bits of Event Horizon sprinkled in. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it begs the question as to why? If it doesn't improve and/or change the narrative I'm not sure what the point was, and this edit accomplishes neither. The shots from Event Horizon don't add anything to Carpenter's film.

That's not to say this is a bad edit. The video and audio quality are fine and I didn't notice any cuts. The special effect changes were really well done and to be honest I was quite impressed by them. That said, I didn't feel like I was watching anything different than "In the Mouth of Madness".

I'm happy I watched this fanedit, I enjoyed it, though I feel the narrative suffered from the inclusion of "Event Horizon" since it didn't really add anything.

Do I recommend the edit? Sure. Why not? But I don't think it's one I need to see again.

The beginning is really strong, the visual effects work is incredible, near seamlessly combining 2 movies in editing, great pacing, but I found the story kinda lacking. I thought more parallels between the stories would be featured. The vibe I got initially was that Weir's backstory was a subtle clue at Trent's backstory. Both characters being driven to the point of obsession to not see that they were walking into a snare. I think the Event Horizon plot should have had a far bigger role in the edit. The scene explaining how the EH folds space could have been a really cool narrative element. *SPOILERS FOR EVENT HORIZON AND IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS* Maybe there could have been an implication that Sutter Cane had to write a story to manipulate reality. The ITMOM stuff was the real world and the Event Horizon stuff could have been a parallel narrative, and the only way the elder gods can enter our world is if the Event Horizon tears apart the fabric of reality. I know it's easier said than done and I'm sure that this might have been an intention on Rollwave's part but showing more of the Event Horizon story could have communicated this idea. Killer Horizon is a great edit of Event Horizon, you could still make it work since it's a very brisk edit and makes Weir the protagonist of Killer Horizon. I think incorporating ideas from that edit could really bring this idea home.

Periodically throughout this edit I got the idea that this was the case, it clicked for me. Weir missing Claire, and Trent being visibly affected by this vision, kinda like Nocturnal Animals. Fiction being a reflection of reality, and where those lines blur. I'm not trying to shit on RollWaves. The amount of work they put in is amazing, I was blown away. I just felt like the narrative potential wasn't 100% realized. I just hope this review was constructive, please don't stop making edits