BROOKLYN HORROR FILM FESTIVAL SESSION 9: 20th Anniversary Screening Reflections by Robert Aaron Mitchell

 

SESSION 9 USA 2001 (Directed by Brad Anderson) 

 

Session 9 is getting a twentieth anniversary screening during this years Brooklyn Horror Film Festival at the beautiful Nitehawk Theater in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. This Tuesday, October 19th 9:30pm. You can get tickets clicking on here.

 

Several years ago I was living in Worcester, Massachusetts and took a drive up to Danvers. It is was a crisp, clear October day when I arrived at the former Danvers State Hospital.  Not much remains of the former State Lunatic Asylum at Danvers is kind of misleading, the original center building is beautiful and remarkably tall. It is also very imposing. The red bricks stood out especially as they contrasted the blue skies of that autumn morning when I visited the grounds. The original building is actually only a tiny remnant how large the sprawling hospital was. The Danvers State Hospital has served as inspiration for H.P. Lovecraft's Arkham Sanatorium as well as Arkham Asylum in the Batman universe. While the building has been influential in fiction, the true-life horrors that happened here are indeed very disturbing. 

 

Today the site is now comprised of renovated apartments. The past of the state hospital is only a short walk away down an unmarked trail and through overgrown bushes that leads to a large granite stone. The stone reads, “The Danvers State Hospital Cemetery “The Echos They Left Behind”” The cemetery contains hundreds of graves of Danvers patients. Only numbers marks the graves. Through the efforts of Pat Deegan and many others, hundreds of the dead have been identified. Many remain anonymous. A lot of times when reading about a film it is remarked that the location is another character in the movie. This sentiment is extremely true about the former Danvers State Hospital in Brad Anderson’s Session 9.

 

The film opens on two men waiting in van bearing a company name and slogan, Hazmat Elimination Co “Asbestos Abatement Professionals” outside a gate to the hospital. The two men are Gordon (Peter Mullan) & Phil (David Caruso) they await Bill Griggs (Paul Guilfoyle) who is holding bids for the asbestos removal job at the former insane asylum. They meet up and proceed on a tour of the grounds.

 

“It’s a pretty simple layout really, if you consider a giant flying bat.” Bill says as they walk down a hallway. Danvers as I mentioned has been a visual inspiration for Arkham Asylum in the Batman universe. Christian Bale who played Batman in the Christopher Nolan films also acted in Brad Anderson’s The Machinist.

 

“Whoa, what the fuck is this?” Phil asks as he looks into a metal tub filled with water “What are you a little scared Phil? This is hydrotherapy. Used to be cutting edge. They’d stuff the nut jobs into cold water I guess as a way to chill them out. Or they’d give them a lobotomy. The prefrontal lobotomy was perfected here at Danvers.”  Bill Griggs (Paul Guilfoyle) As they leave the room we see the full extent of what they were seeing. A sheet with restraints covers one of the tubs. Hydrotherapy would consist of placing a person into extremely hot or cold water, as it was believed this torture would alert the parts of the brain the psychiatrists wanted to affect.

 

As Bill continues the walk through “Oh there’s a lovely cemetery behind the machine shop. No headstones, just numbers.“ As they get further into the building it gets darker and darker. “This is where they keep the extreme patients…psychotic. You know what they call ward A? The snake pit.” Gordon pauses and looks down the hallway and sees the chair from the opening shot of the film. “Hello, Gordon” some strange voice says as Gordon stays transfixed on the chair. Phil snaps him out of this reverie.

 

The camera movement and the use of light and shadow really infuse Session 9 with the sort of creepiness that really disturbs someone watching the movie. I believe of all the types of emotions and scares a horror film can achieve, to create a truly affecting foreboding that literally gets under ones skin is very difficult tone to achieve and sustain. Brad Anderson and his team elicit this feeling to an amazing extent in the film.

 

“Reclaiming the dark past to build a brighter future.” Bill says as the walk through winds down. As far as the job goes, it is difficult and a huge space. Gordon looks up the ceiling and points out that it contains crocidolite asbestos. Otherwise known as blue asbestos. It is considered the most hazardous type of asbestos. The job was severely undercut by the owner of Hazmat Elimination Company. Time is also limited; Bill wants the job done before Columbus Day, in order to get construction crews in. Phil says it’ll take three weeks to get done. Gordon says two weeks, much to Phil’s chagrin.

 

Just before stepping back outside, Phil stops and asks Bill, “Hey, what’s this?” Phil enters a room, which is covered in dozens, and dozens of illustrations cut out from magazines and books. “Seclusion, that’s what they called the patients rooms back then. A part of some therapy that was big in the seventies. Art therapy.” Gordon is once again transfixed. Outside Gordon tells Bill they’ll get the job done in one week.

 

Gordon sits outside his house and watches his wife with their new baby. A palpable sense of dread is felt.

 

The crew begins to work. Another member of the crew is introduced, Hank (Josh Lucas) Turns out Hank is dating Phil’s ex-girlfriend Amy. The other guys on the crew are, Mike (Stephen Gevedon) and Gordon’s cousin Jeff (Brendan Sexton III). The crew has lunch and Mike relates the horrific tale of Patricia Willard. Is it real or urban legend?  They get back to work.

 

The screams of the patients are in the flakes of paint falling off of the walls.

 

Everyone leaves, except for Mike. He has found an old reel-to-reel tape recorder. He sits in a dilapidated office and hits play. Voices from the past come alive. “I know this is difficult Mary and that’s why we are here to help.” Mary’s distraught and anguished voice fills the room. These are the recorded sessions of which Session 9 takes it’s title from. To say more would be to say far too much.

 

The crew is falling apart. Is it the extreme workload in a short amount of time, the personal relationships, the home life stress, the asbestos or is it the sinister past of the very building and horrors that unfolded within affecting the crew? It could very well be, all of it.

 

The film works for a lot of reasons, in large part because this five-man crew really feels as though they are indeed a crew of asbestos removal guys in Massachusetts. I find this story of an asbestos team working on the building even more remarkable, now that the actual building has become high-end apartments. The doctor (Lonnie Farmer) and Mary aka Princess, Billy and Simon (Jurian Hughes) really have to be mentioned. The audience only hears their voices through the recorded sessions; together they are really the foundation of the mystery and unsettling tone of the film. 

 

I believe that the very place of Danvers State Hospital seeps into the film. The score by Golden Climax Twins (The Mangler, The Chained) is haunting. Ultimately, the horror of the film is not built off of cheap scares but a slow I hesitate to use the word slow. Meticulous is a far better world. Session 9 is a meticulous buildup towards the haunting tale of Mary as well as the five guys working in her lingering presence. Session 9 is twenty years old. Revisiting the film today I can say, it still holds up as an unsettling, scary movie.

A DECADE OF INTERVIEWS 2010 - 2019: Soldier Of Cinema Robert Aaron Mitchell

As the decade draws to a close I thought it would be cool to look back at a decade of interviews I have conducted. This is no small undertaking I have been fortunate to interview a lot of people over the past ten years. What follows is one interview for each year. This is not be exclusionary, I am thankful for every person I have met under the strange circumstances of meeting them for a few seconds and then asking questions as a video camera records. What follows are only from video interviews not the numerous email and phone interviews from the now soon to be past decade.

2010 STAKE LAND TIFF World Premiere

At the 2010 Midnight Madness program I spoke with Director Jim Mickle who has gone on to make several more feature films as well as Hap & Leonard featuring the beloved characters of Joe R. Lansdale, actor and writer Nick Damici and as well as genre legend Larry Fessenden who in the past decade has continued to produce and direct provocative genre films as well as co-produce and contribute to Tales Beyond The Pale a horror podcast in the spirit of 1930s radio dramas. Larry has also written horror video games Until Dawn and Man Of Medan. These interviews would wind up on the DVD and Blu-ray release of the movie.


2011 OFF! NXNE Music Festival
I was working with my good friend Ryan O'Shaughnessy and his Tune In TO website. I interviewed Keith Morris, Dimitri Coats, Steven Shane McDonald and Mario Rubalcaba the members of the punk group OFF! this was a huge thrill for me because Keith Morris was the first singer of Black Flag. I have always enjoyed running around doing interviews at music festivals, a completly different vibe than my usual film festival beat.


2012 THE LORDS OF SALEM TIFF World Premiere Interviews with Rob Zombie, Sheri Moon Zombie and actor Jeff Daniel Phillips. Doing world premiere red carpet interviews are very short usually not substantive affairs. I try to infuse something unique in this quick snippets of conversation. My research lead me to the fact that Rob Zombie was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts which is not far from Salem. I brought this up as an ice breaker and our quick conversation lead to Stanley Kubrick. At the moment I felt we were vibing one another the moment was over. It was also cool that the film was well received at Midnight Madness and holds up. 2013 R100 TIFF World Premiere with Hitoshi Matsumoto This was an extremly fun interview. It is always great to meet filmmakers from all over the world and it was a huge thrill to meet Mr. Matsumoto especially in this setting where red carpets are a rarity in Japan most filmmakers only do formal press conferences. It was also awesome that I was able to make the great comedic legend laugh. 2014 TUSK World Premiere Interview with Kevin Smith There was a lot of things swirling around this night behind the scenes. Time was running out and it looked as though I was not going to speak with Kevin Smith. I did and said it was great that he was back to making movies and he gave me a huge bear hug which has since been written about in a dissertation and published in a book. 2015 SLUMS THE CITIES OF TOMORROW The In Light Human Rights Film Festival I was the videographer for a new film festival that was created in the anthropology department at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. Later in 2015 I would interview Sir Patrick Stewart at the Green Room premiere but I went with this conversation with professor Nicolas Reeves because I really enjoyed our conversation and the documentary is becoming more and more relevant as the wealth divide increases. 2016 THE BAD BATCH TIFF Premiere with Jason Momoa This is one of my most talked about interviews I have done and happen before already star Jason Momoa was launched into superstardom. It also features another bear hug. Guess I am a huggable guy! 2017 BODIED TIFF World Premiere with Dizaster This was the opening film this year and was great to research and learn more about the underground hip-hop battle scene. I had no idea that Toronto had such a vibrant scene. The film was very provacative and in your face so was battle rapper Dizaster. It was also another interview that ended in a hug! 2018 THE WIND TIFF World Premiere It is great to go into a movie not knowing anything about it. From an interview and research stand point though it makes an interview quite difficult. I really enjoyed these interviews at THE WIND Premiere with director Emma Tammi, writer Teresa Sutherland and actors Caitlin Gerard, Julia Goldani Telles The flow and ease of the interviews went really well and I was happy to support this film. 2019 FIRST LOVE Interview with Takashi Miike This was another year that featured some very cool interviews. The long awaited return of Richard Stanley and the few minutes with elusive Nicolas Cage, third time really was the charm this year but I went with my interview with legendary filmmaker Takashi Miike. In my film collection I probably have more films by him than any other filmmaker, in large part to how prolific he is. This would mark the second time I have interviewed Mr. Miike this time it was great that I could sit down with him for a longer interview. Interviews with a translator can always be difficult but I feel this interview flowed well. Honorable Mention SADAKO VS KAYAKO 2016 The photo on this post is from this premiere and one of my favorite photos my good friend Ian Goring has taken of me over the years. This was a really fun premiere and threw out the normal interview process out the window.

THE MIND'S EYE: Interview with Writer Director Joe Begos [From The Archives 09/10/15]

    Larry Fessenden speaking with Robert Mitchell at The Mind's Eye world premiere.

Joe Begos returns to the Midnight Madness program with his sophomore film The Mind's Eye. His first film Almost Human the alien abduction, slasher film threw a bunch of blood and alien slime upon the Ryerson theater screen. I recently I had the opportunity to speak to Joe about the making of The Mind's Eye. -- Robert A. Mitchell

Where did the idea for The Mind's Eye come from?

It just sort of organically evolved from me wanting to do a really violent, badass telekinesis movie. There are really far too few of them. I was itching to do a revenge movie as well, and the two seemed like a match made in heaven, and I built the story from there. Like my last film, I wanted to make something that I would KILL to see.
 
You have assembled quite a cast for the film. Larry Fessenden (Stake Land, You're Next) Noah Segan (Deadgirl, Brick) John Speredakos (The House of the Devil, The Innkeepers). You are also working again with Graham Skipper who played the lead in Almost Human. What was the casting process like? Did you write parts for specific people?

The casting process was pretty awesome. I wrote the lead for Graham from the start, and then handful of the roles were written for specific people, and the rest of the roles were filled out by me picking up the phone and giving someone a call. I have a love for actors that look supremely blue collar, to me it makes there movie more realistic, so it was important to get actors that are recognizable to the genre, but can also act their asses off and don't look like a cosmopolitan model. I think we hit a pretty good balance, as everyone was able to turn in a phenomenal performance, and to me, look like they could be believable civilians in 1991 New England.
 
What did you learn from making Almost Human and how did you apply that to The Mind's Eye? Did you expand upon your usage of practical special effects?

Yeah, there are so many effects in this movie my SPFX guy, Brian Spears wanted to kill me on numerous occasions haha. Not only did we have practical blood and gore, but he had to coordinate with a few other departments as we had tons of wire work, pyrotechnics, squibs, breakaways, you name it. I learned what was possible and how to stretch the budget on almost human even more than I had on any of the shorts I had made in my life. I was determined to take whatever extra money we could get for our budget and put it ALL in front of the camera.
 
Both films are set in the winter. What do you like about this season as a backdrop to your stories?

I love when seasons give movies a specific characteristic and atmosphere to the point where the season IS almost a character. I had actually planned to shoot this film in the fall, with all of the beautiful autumn colors, but we weren't able to obtain money fast enough. So therefore the movie was pushed to winter, and we were (un)fortunate to have almost 100 inches of snow during shooting. This was a MAJOR pain in the ass, but man does it look awesome!!
 
What kind of cinematic experience awaits the Midnight Madness audience who enter into this world of telekinetic people?

My biggest goal is making sure people have an absolute fucking blast when watching one of our movies!

Originally Appeared 09/10/15 Midnight Madness Blog

MEET THE PRODUCERS: Interview with Larry Fessenden

Let me introduce you to legendary N.Y. producer Larry Fessenden, producer of Stake Land

Larry Fessenden may not be a name you instantly recognize but the name is one that has probably been involved in some of your favorite films. At this year's Midnight Madness alone Mr. Fessenden's reach is felt, from Ron Perlman that has worked numerous times with Mr Fessenden, from The Last Winter which was written and directed by Larry as well as I Sell The Dead which Mr. Fessenden not only produced with his company Glass Eye Pix but also acted in. If you were looking really close during Brad Anderson's Vanishing on 7th St, there was Larry on the big screen again, which brings me to Stake Land. Stake Land was also produced by Glass Eye Pix. He has over forty acting credits, has produced 35 films and has numerous directing credits for feature films, shorts and documentaries. In short. Mr. Fessenden is not only a remarkable talent but is truly a tireless advocate for independent cinema.

As others are talking about recession and economic downturns you and Glass Eye Pix seems to be thriving in the film world, how do you equate your success in remaining in business and producing quality work?

We were very fortunate to have had financial support throughout the recession of Dark Sky Films. The association began with Ti West’s THE HOUSE OF THE DEVIL and that lead us to strike a deal to produce three more movies over the course of 18 months: BITTER FEAST, STAKE LAND and HYPOTHERMIA. And that was followed by another Ti West film, THE INNKEEPERS. So we’ve had a very good run of it with Dark Sky. In the 2000’s Glass Eye Pix invested in the careers of several filmmakers including Ti West, Graham Reznick, James McKenney, and Glenn McQuaid, as well as Kelly Reichardt and Ilya Chaiken, and the consistent model was to make films of artistic integrity at a very low budget. During more lucrative times we could get reimbursed for our efforts. It is our hope that in these lean years our model of frugality and originality will be attractive to new investors. It is important not to discount the sheer talent we have tapped in to. And I believe there is a tone throughout all the films from Glass Eye Pix that stands in marked contrast to the mainstream or even “indie” output and that is our brand.

How difficult was it to find the money to produce Stake Land? What challenges did you face that were unique to this film?

Stake Land was the most solid pitch we had for our slate of three movies with Dark Sky Films; it had the elements that looked good on paper: vampires, the post apocalyptic setting, and the director Jim Mickle had made a successful first film but still was hungry enough to go from no budget to low budget with gusto and conviction. So the film was financed easily, as part of an overall slate. The challenges were many from there. First, the script had to be reworked over several months to shape it into the feature it’s become, and then the epic scope of the story had to be fit into the budget. We determined to split the shoot into two parts, so we could experience on film the change in seasons. This was a gamble that paid off, but one that can stress a budget and crew and spook most financiers. As with all our films, we choose to emphasize post production: sound design, music, graphics, visual effects, the color correct and mix, all are an essential part of the experience we want to deliver, and again, the challenge is to strategize to get the most out of what is left of the budget after a grueling shoot. By using the same team of people in post-production on several films, we have been able to get a lot of bang for the buck.

What is something that you have learned as a producer that you wish you knew when you started out with your first feature Habit?

There is no one thing that has changed since I made HABIT in 1994. With HABIT, I established many of the principals that I still employ: A small crew (there were seven of us on HABIT), an open schedule (we shot over 45 days), and a long post-production emphasizing sound design and a rich, live score, all driven by a resourceful, single-minded auteur (which was me at the time). With HABIT, I endured a tsunami of festival and distribution rejections and so I released the film myself, compelling me to learn about marketing and exhibition. That experience taught me that there are no answers in show biz, there is only conviction. I have applied that to film after film with various degrees of success since, and it has helped several careers get started through Glass Eye Pix. Another thing I have learned since HABIT is I need my own producer to take care of the nuts and bolts of production. I may have a philosophical overview that drives the ship, but it was HABIT’s producer Dayton Taylor that got the film made, Jeff Levy-Hinte who got my subsequent films made, and now Peter Phok and Brent Kunkle have been instrumental in getting a slew of new pictures made. Collaboration in film at every level is essential.

Originally Appeared 9/17/10 Midnight Madness Blog

THE MIND'S EYE World Premiere Interviews Joe Begos, John Speredakos, Graham Skipper & Larry Fessenden

Joe Begos returned to the 2015 Midnight Madness program at the Toronto International Film Festival with his second feature film The Mind's Eye. His first film Almost Human premiered in Toronto at 2013 program. Robert A. Mitchell was on the red carpet and spoke with Joe about his follow up telekinetic horror film. Robert also spoke with actors John Speredakos, Graham Skipper and Larry Fessenden.

Larry Fessenden Interview with Robert A. Mitchell

October 2008 was the first time I met Larry Fessenden after the premiere of I Sell The Dead at the Toronto After Dark Film Festival. We had a great interview discussing his career making films from the the formation of his production company Glass Eye Pix his own genre pictures from Habit to The Last Winter as well as acting in films directed by Martin Scorsese (Bringing Out The Dead) and Jim Jarmusch (Broken Flowers) just to name a few films and directors he has worked with. Larry is extremely talented, charismatic, passionate about making films and has a great knowledge of cinema.