Excerpts from The Listing Attic
Edward Gorey (1954)
Session 9
2001 Dir. Brad Anderson An asbestos removal firm headed by harassed and down-on-his-luck Gordon (Peter Mullan) begin working in an abandoned psychiatric hospital. Under pressure to get the job finished in as little time as possible, the close-knit group begins to fracture and unravel as the oppressive atmosphere of the building entwines itself with their already troubled and fragile psyches, leading to the unveiling of sordid secrets, mental break-down and murder… In the wake of films such as The Blair Witch Project (1999) and The Sixth Sense (1999), many horror films utilised a more subtle approach in their efforts to terrify and extract more cerebral chills. The ‘less is more’ approach of film makers such as Val Lewton is strongly evident in Session 9 , a film that perversely revels in its icy suggestiveness and shadowy menace. Even without showing us something scary, Anderson conveys a particular tone of psychological horror in much of the dialogue: characters discuss the fa
