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About 5 Sessions Too Long: Session 9
by Michael Flanagan

Wimpy

Session 9 was not a great film.  It wasn’t even really that good.  The screenplay was poorly written, the characters were bland, and the plot had more holes in it than the body count at the end.  It spent too much time…spending time.  We’re given lengthy and meaningless shots of menacing glances and sorrowful glares that could have been replaced by plot development, or at least a few more scary scenes.

And the scary scenes are what make the movie somewhat bearable, because these guys (director, writer Brad Anderson and writer Stephen Gevedon) know how to scare.  They add on to what Blair Witch taught us (again): fear is not brought about by what is seen, but by what is not seen.  They use lighting, music, and sound effects to enhance the quality of fear.  They even set up for clichéd moments of horror and then don’t follow through, which serves well to keep the audience on their toes.  The abandoned mental institution, which, in need of a good asbestos removal, is the central figure in the film, provides great atmosphere that will leave you considering covering your eyes in parts.

Unfortunately, the great scares are rare, and the rest of the movie plays out as a pseudo-whodunit that doesn’t really make sense.  For example, David Caruso’s character shifts three times in the movie, for no real purpose other than to confuse and mislead the audience, again to no end.  The setup is too long, and as a result the quick payoff lacks real essence.

Anderson seemed to follow the setup of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, complete with a beginning tour of the building and scenes divided up into titled days.  Kubrick, however, knew how to provide a payoff, and he did it via Jack Nicholson running through a snowbound house with a bloody fireman’s axe, uttering insane phrases that found new ways to fit into our culture.  Session 9 has nothing to offer our culture or its own ending.  But it does point in the right direction of what horror should be, and let’s hope filmmakers are watching.

Because I can’t handle any more “killer in a cheese-grater mask killing the horny stars of the WB” movie.

All Filler, Low Killer: Session 9
by Christian De Matteo

Wimpy

            I think The Sixth Sense and The Blair Witch Project were the last times I was chilled in a theater by a horror movie.  I don’t like being disgusted or shocked with blood, but I do love a true, spine-freezing scare.  I was hoping Brad Anderson’s Session 9 would finally satisfy that desire again.

            What I got was a quality attempt at art house horror that just didn’t pull it off.  Anderson (Next Stop Wonderland) and (first time) co-writer Stephen Gevedon try desperately to make the film character-driven, working hard at big-time development, but instead get about halfway into solid character development and then either stop developing and begin cliché repetition or go totally against the previous character plotting.

            The latter is the unfortunate case with David Caruso.  I must be one of his seven remaining fans, and was very happy that he was in the movie.  And he does a great job with the script he was given.  Unfortunately, the script he was given calls for him to be three different characters in one body: He’s the shoulder-to-lean-on buddy of Gordon (Peter Mullan) and also the paranoid, suspicion-raiser/trouble-maker.  Sure, he does both great, but the traits just don’t work in the same character. Meanwhile, as Caruso’s schizophrenic performance becomes the focus, the other previously developed characters fade back into cardboard cutout oblivion.

            90% of the 100-minute runtime is spent on gratuitous setup, 70% of which is not particularly engrossing.  The scares are few and Grand Canyons apart, and though done exceptionally well when finally done, too much time has already passed for you to care enough to fear.  The time when you felt close to the characters has come and gone, so when the lightening-fast climax finally arrives, it’s too fast and too late to matter.  And this is the biggest shame of the movie, because these were the first scares in years that I’ve seen done right: little blood, high suspense.  But it’s a short-lived payoff to a painfully long setup, and thus fails to scare anywhere near where it might have had the film been paced much better.

            Ultimately, Anderson’s attempt to be subtle means he doesn’t drop enough hints to keep the audience engaged.  His desire to be tricky bores the viewer with a plethora of cliched and unnecessary red herrings.  His desire to make a quality horror movie remains as unsatisfied as I left the theater.

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