susan granger’s review of ” session 9 ” ( usa films )
sometimes you just get more than your bargained for . . . like when boston-based hazmat elimination , run by scottish actor peter mullan and his trusty assistant , david caruso , assures a town engineer ( paul guilifoyle ) that they can remove insidious asbestos fibers from a victorian hospital facility in a week .
erected in 1871 , deserted and decomposing since 1985 , the danvers mental hospital , is one of the most malevolent ” locations ” ever chosen for a film .
the structure is so massive – with its labyrinth of rubble-strewn corridors , collapsing floors , stagnant pools of water , isolation cells , and ominous surgical chambers where experimental pre-frontal lobotomies were performed – that their task seems impossible within that time frame .
and each member of their inexperienced crew ( stephan gevedon , brandon sexton iii , and josh lucas ) is coping with his own personal demons as , one by one , their minds seem to be affected by the grim areas in which they’re working .
the film’s title is derived from salvaged reel-to-reel audio-recorded sessions involving the demonic possession of a young woman who is suffering from multiple personalities .
by the time session 9 occurs so do dreadful disasters .
filmmaker brad anderson obviously envisioned this as a gruesome chainsaw-massacre-type ghost story but the script lacks structure and isn’t particularly scary .
the conclusion is more ludicrous than convincing .
on the granger movie gauge of 1 to 10 , ” session 9 ” is a dark , gloomy 4 . silly me . . . at
first , i thought that the original name of the danvers lunatic asylum bore some reference to mrs . danvers , the creepy housekeeper played by judith anderson in alfred hitchcock’s truly terrifying ” rebecca ” that also involved a cavernous mansion called manderley .