Review of Session 9 (2001) by Al M — 11 Aug 2010

For a USA (the company) film starring David Caruso, Session 9 is a surprisingly well-crafted, well-acted, and creepy piece of horror filmmaking. Session 9 takes the haunted house paradigm and creatively plays with it by setting itself in an abandoned mental asylum as it is undergoing asbestos removal before being reopened as the town archives.

Nothing ever moves by itself or goes bump in the night in Brad Anderson's psychological thriller; instead, it is as if the haunting works a completely silent, subconscious level as it slowly infects the minds of the workers.

Session 9 keeps you guessing throughout the film about who has performed what heinous misdeeds, what (if anything) is causing the general eerie sense of evil in the asylum, and if the forces in the movie are supernatural or merely psychological.

Session 9 exemplifies how good horror should be made: the characters are real and have haunting backstories that are portrayed well by the actors, the film does not rely on gore or special effects but atmosphere, and the film remains in the realm of what Freud and Todorov would call the uncanny, a liminal state in which we are never sure if there are rational explanations for the events or whether there are paranormal forces at work.