Session 9 (2001)

Movie: Session 9 (2001), directed by Brad Anderson

Watched on: Netflix

Ran: 8.18 miles, 8’25”/mile, 01:08:57 (recovery run)

 

It’s Slow-Burn Saturday here at Running Scared! Which is absolutely not a thing, but it sounded good in my head, so what the heck, let’s just ride that wave. I hereby fully acknowledge that it was criminal of me to wait two dang DECADES before watching Session 9, but I plead ignorance, Your Honor: had anyone bothered to tell me that 1) it’s set right here in Massachusetts, specifically at the abandoned Danvers State Hospital; 2) the chucklehead nephew character is played by a grown-up Warren from Empire Records; 3) that it’s a remarkable piece of psychological horror that masterfully constructs a teetering Jenga tower of crushing dread from elements and moments that seem unremarkable if not outright mundane when considered apart from the construct itself; and 4) maybe you didn’t hear me but it’s got frickin’ WARREN from EMPIRE RECORDS, why was I not informed?

 

Session 9 is one of those films that’s simultaneously easy and difficult to describe in terms of plot, in part because the plot isn’t really what makes it work. The easy version is that this is the tale of a five-man asbestos removal team who is under the gun to clean out the abandoned and crumbling Kirkbride Mental Health Hospital, which the town is renovating to use as a new town hall. Gordon, the owner of the asbestos removal business, underbid and overpromised in desperation to win the contract, and now everyone is feeling the pressure. Strange things start happening, people get freaked out, people don’t show up, and all the while, one of the workers is listening to the session tapes of a former patient with multiple personality disorder, whose story seems to be infecting the team.

 

The hard version is… well, hard. It’s tough to describe how, over the course of the one week in which they need to finish a three-week job, interpersonal issues rankle, tempers flare, and weird behaviors slowly build a sense of unease that sticks in your lungs like a tumor.  But just like a tumor, by the time you realize it’s there it’s grown entirely out of control and people are gonna die. If you just plain removed all of the horror elements, this could ultimately have worked almost as well if it were a locked-room character study: all of the progression really stems from how these characters interact, their personal histories with each other, whom they trust and distrust, the secrets they keep and the ones they tell. It wouldn’t work at all without a really solid script and fine work by everyone in the cast.

 

Speaking of characterization, though, there ARE horror elements, and Kirkbride (in reality the actual factual Danvers State Hospital which inspired the script) is a character unto itself, a living-dead lurking embodiment of decay. Everything about it sweats dread which drips off the screen in oily bullets. I’m hard-pressed to name another horror film whose onscreen world was conjured by a perfect true-life setting; maybe The Blair Witch Project? But pretty much any chunk of forest would serve the latter, whereas I doubt any other place, real or constructed, could so perfectly establish the mood that makes Session 9 click at a deep level. In the end it’s Kirkbride’s weight and presence that makes the conceit of the patient history and session tapes work as an influence from… the past? Geography? The ghosts of the long-dead? You’re never certain, but by the time the credits roll somehow you know without knowing that the death-spiral you just watched wasn’t entirely just somebody snapping under the pressure.

 

Session 9 is also one of those films that, once you arrive at the end, you realize couldn’t have ended any other way. It warrants a second viewing at minimum, because based on what I remember, the DNA of the finale is visible in details of the phenotype from the very beginning. I don’t think it cheats in any way.

 

So don’t go into this one expecting a high body count, buckets of blood, and inventive deaths. What we have here is atmospheric horror at its best, the sort of gradual build that feels like you’re being buried alive by the sand slipping through an hourglass—which also means it’s not for everyone, and there will absolutely be horror fans that will DETEST Session 9, if they can even sit through it. It requires attention, or else it will fall flat, so save it for a time when you can turn out the lights, hunker down, and give it the focus it deserves. If you invest the time, the payoff is solid. 

 

Also, Warren from Empire Records is in it. Thought I should maybe mention that.