In Shakespeare’s Macbeth, the relentless and arbitrary suffering of human life is summarized as “a tale…, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing,” and the almighty writer of that tale, God, is reconceived as “an idiot.” Centuries later, that notion of a chaotic universe governed by stupidity echoes throughout IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS, as director John Carpenter reveals his own version of the omnipotent idiot: God as “a hack horror writer.”