An asbestos abatement crew wins the bid for an abandoned insane asylum. What should be a straightforward, if rather rushed, job, is complicated by the personal histories of the crew. In particular, Hank is dating Phil's old girlfriend, and Gordon's new baby seems to be unnerving him more than should be expected. Things get more complicated as would-be lawyer Mike plays the tapes from a former patient with multiple personalities, including the mysterious Simon who does not appear until Session 9, and as Hank disappears after finding some old coins.
Written by
Jon Reeves
Plot Synopsis:
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Kirkbride Mental Health Hospital, built in 1871 is being reclaimed as a town hall and renovated after being closed down nearly fifteen years earlier in 1985. Hazmat Elimination Company, an asbestos removal company run by Gordon Fleming (played by Peter Mullan) and his associate Phil (played by David Carusoe), are the first to start on the renovation of the building. The film opens with a lightly humoured tour through the asylum led by Bill Griggs (a cameo by Paul Guilfoyle) as Gordon and Phil get their first glimpse of the aforementioned mad house. Distracted by ghastly rooms and one hallway in particular, Gordon hears a voice call out to him but is snapped back to reality by partner Phil. After the heebie-jeebies have been established cut to a scene of Gordon sitting alone in his truck as he fawns over pictures of his newborn and watches her and his wife as they play out front of their home. This scene is cut short by terrible screams and a haunting feeling that perhaps all is not well in the Fleming household.Now cue Gordon's employees: Hank (played by Josh Lucas), Gordon's nephew Jeff (Brandon Sexton III), and Mike (Stephen Gevedon) a former lawschool student who's father was the district attorney who indirectly led to the closing of Kirkbride through a patient's lawsuit in 1984.
As the film glides along with horror stories of old, employee banter, and Gordon's increasingly distant behaviour, Mike finds some old recorded sessions (labeled 1-9) in an office while checking a generator and Hank stumbles upon coins from the 1800's in another part of the building. Mike begins stealing time away from the job to sneak downstairs and listen to the recorded sessions which are centered around patient #444 Mary Hobbes, a patient with multiple personalities. As the week continues Gordon becomes more irritable, Mike continues deeper into the sessions and Hank heads back late at night, for the silver dollar payload, and mysteriously disappears.
After Hank's disappearance the rest of the crew becomes more and more edgy as the week continues. Gordon's history with his distant wife comes to light, Phil's anger and impatience with Gordon becomes a factor and all the while Mike gets closer and closer to the end of the sessions with Mary Hobbes. You begin to see the number 444 show more often in the film on rooms and tombstones, and Gordon reveals to Phil that he hit his wife by accident that night after their tour of the asylum. Phil goes to Mike with this news recommending that Gordon could use some time off, all the while unbeknownst to them Gordon listens from around the corner. Just then Hank is found wandering the halls by Jeff.
As Jeff runs to tell the others Hank disappears again and the manhunt is on. With flaring tension between Phil and Gordon, Mike and Jeff swimming in a sea of apprehensive paranoia and the manhunt for the missing Hank, the story reaches its climax with a shot of each character alone against the unseen villian. The film is tied together as a replacement employee for Hank arrives for work and searches the seemingly abandoned Hospital for Gordon and the others. Come to the room where Hank lies on the floor still breathing, Phil telling Gordon to wake up , and the arrival of the new employee. It is revealed through flashbacks that Gordon has now killed each one of his employees, nephew, wife and child. The stress of life had caught up with Gordon and after killing the man who had just arrived and realized his deadly misgivings; the film ends with Gordon apologizing to his dead wife on a broken phone and the voice who has been calling to him throughout the film is revealed as Simon, Mary Hobbes' third personality. Simon caps the movies finish as he speaks on the the final recorded session as the one who "live(s) in the weak, and the wounded."
Behind the tunnel with the rubber gloves, the cast and crew signed the wall. Brad Anderson wrote: "We did ASBESTOS we could!"
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Only 3 rooms had additions outside of the natural setting for atmosphere, the kitchen had meat hooks hung, the tunnel had plastic surgical gloves hung up, and the hydrotherapy room had a metal tub added. Almost everything else related to the asylum setting was found on site as the crew scoured the building for set dressing to keep things authentic. The filmmakers even reported finding old patient tissue and blood samples on the premises, which they did not film out of fear.
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The fictional "Patricia Willard scandal" at Danvers State Hospital, cited by Mike at the film's beginning, strongly appears to have been inspired by a real-life wave of problematic "Satanism and sex-abuse" allegations that swept the United States circa the 1980s, including (among others) one involving the Amirault family in nearby Malden, Massachusetts. Reporter Dorothy Rabinowitz won a Pulitzer Prize for her book chronicling that bizarre case, "No Crueler Tyrannies: Accusation, False Witness, and Other Terrors of Our Times," in 2001.
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Actor David Caruso reports in the official Production Notes that he saw "something pass my window" when shooting inside the Bonner Medical Building of Danvers State Hospital. "I didn't want to tell anybody, because people would start looking at me strangely..." Actor Peter Mullan also reports strange happenings on the set. He claims that while filming on the roof, a voice in his head told him to jump off to see what would happen. Mullan said the building brought out a morbid kind of "overactive curiosity."
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During the scene shot outside Danvers when Bill (Paul Guilfoyle) and Gordon (Peter Mullan) are discussing the bid for the asbestos abatement job, a student pilot was flying circles overhead for about 3 hours. This forced the talent and crew to film the sequence in spurts starting when the plane was furthest away and stopping as it grew nearer.
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The script was specifically written to take place at the Danvers State Hospital.
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David Caruso ad-libbed the line "It's going to get ugly."
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Brad Anderson was inspired to use the Danvers Mental Hospital as he drove past it every day.
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Mary Hobbes' paperwork states she was fourteen years old in 1951 when the murders took place and it was 1974 when she was committed and interviewed, so Mary would have been thirty-seven.
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This was one of the first feature films shot using Sony's 24P HD video, which shoots at 24 frames per second, like film, as opposed to the 30 frames per second of conventional NTSC video. Using this technology, Brad Anderson and director of photography Uta Briesewitz were able to produce the uniquely effective, deep-focus images using mostly natural light.
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The grave markers in the cemetery and the doors in the morgue were made of Styrofoam. The morgue was cleared out already, so they had to bring in props.
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Very few sets were built for this film.
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Almost the entire film was shot in the Kirkbride administration complex, (wing or ward F) but many scenes were filmed in the tunnels, the roof, and wings A, B, C, D, and E.
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Brad Anderson had Brendan Sexton III in mind to play Jeff while writing the script.
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Danvers State Hospital was built in 1874 on a 257-foot-high glacial drumlin named Hathorne Hill. The hill got its name from its original owner Judge John Hathorne. John Hathorne was appointed by Governor Sir William Phips to be a judge in the Salem Witch Trials. Judge John Hathorne was also the great-grandfather of American novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne. Note the spelling variation of the last name: In his early 20s, Nathaniel added the "w" to hide his relation to the only judge involved in the Salem Witch Trials to never repent his actions.
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The movie is mentioned in the book Project 17 by Laurie Faria Stolarz. The book takes place one night in Danvers State Hospital. A group of teens spend the night to film a movie, and encounter supernatural events - much like the psychological aspect of this movie. The main character in the book references the group's actions as reminding him of Brad Anderson's movie Session 9.
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Brad Anderson was originally going to use a spinning camera motif throughout the whole movie.
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The film unit only ever used a very small percentage of the building as most of it was off limits as it was unsafe.
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Though uncredited, this was the last film to be released by October Films.
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A large subplot was ultimately cut involving a homeless woman who lived and lurked among the building and the workers. The filmmakers deleted this because test viewings found her to confuse viewers who thought she was Mary Hobbes (the patient on the tapes.)
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The vintage magazine clipping on the wall of one of the rooms at the Danvers Hospital was featured on the website www.yourprops.com after it was rescued from the building before the building was torn down. However, most of the other photos and clippings on the walls couldn't be salvaged because they were destroyed by mold and humidity.
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The building is apartments now, only 2 of the wings were saved along with the main building.
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Inside Mary Hobbes room, her mural contains pictures from magazines of Society women of the time, happy families, Christmas trees, and A Barbie doll of the 70's period with kisses all over it, drawings of ice skaters and ballerinas, an toy packaging of a horse and a faded baby picture which is probably of herself that looks eerily similar to Gordon's daughter, Emma.
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When Mike says that Jeff "might be party in the back, but I'll make sure he's business in the front," he was referring to Jeff's mullet hairstyle.
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The Patricia Willard Scandal that the men talk about during lunch was based on a popular book that was being debunked around the time of filming, titled "Michelle Remembers". It was endorsed by Oprah Winfrey and mentioned Satanic rituals, repressed memories, human sacrifices and molestation. The author of the novel later came forward and admitted it was all planted in her head.
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Not many props were needed for the making of Session 9. Unfortunately though, much of the building had been looted and damaged by local teenagers using it as a place to party and drink, which is where much of the graffiti came from. Most of the equipment left behind had been stolen, but a lot of the wall art, such as the taped-up book clippings and photos, were the real deal and had been left behind by patients. Upon the hospital's closure, any official records of which patients stayed at Danvers were moved to other hospitals, to archives and to records management offices throughout Massachusetts.
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What Griggs says at the beginning of the film about homeless former patients trying to break back into Danvers has a ring of truth to it. It was a real problem for the town after the hospital's closure, and police officers often had to be called to round up trespassers. The building also became a hot-spot for "urban explorers" looking to get some photos of everything. This was not a good idea. The building was sturdy on the outside, but the many papers and drywall panels left behind quickly went moldy, posing a health risk, and there really were asbestos in the building, too. Flooding, rats and mice, criminal activity, rotten food and other unpleasant things began to inhabit the building, to the point at which it simply wasn't safe anymore.
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At point in the film, Mike calls Jeff "Princess" to which he immediately says "Fuck off, I'm not your princess dude". Princess is one of the personalities of Mary Hobbes.
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The job was supposed to be for one week starting on Monday to Monday, the 13th as Phil told the group during their first lunch together with a $10,000 bonus given by the town included at the completion of it.
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Filmed during the Summer of 2000 was released during the Summer a year later in limited release due to USA Films going bankrupt. This was the last film produced by USA Films and is now under the Universal Pictures banner.
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Session 9 was the inspiration for the 2016 horror novella "Danvers: the Reckoning".
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The only CG in the film is the lobotomy tool which is pulled out of Josh Lucas's eye. Lucas raised his head to signify the tool being extracted from his skull.
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A subplot was filmed involving a homeless woman who lives in the asylum. In the original ending, she witnesses all the murders and then kills Gordon. According to the DVD commentary, this subplot was removed because test audiences became confused, thinking she was actually Mary (the voice on the tape).
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The shot in which you see Mike (Stephen Gevedon) walking through the gym from the balcony before his demise, was originally a long shot from the point of view from the homeless woman that was in the original subplot of the film that was cut. The full version of the scene is featured on the DVD's deleted scenes.
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When Mike is inside Gordon's van looking for a part for the generator, he finds roses on top of the red stuff used to contain the asbestos inside the hospital. These are similar to the same roses that Gordon was giving to his wife in the beginning of the movie and the red stuff is inferred to be blood. Meaning that he had killed his wife or was planning to.
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Before Hank's attack by Gordon, he sees a jar of JIF Peanut Butter on the floor where he had collected all the coins and items found in the area he had worked on during the day. This very same jar of Peanut Butter was inside Gordon't bag in the beginning of the movie along with the Oreo Cookies (which Jeff finds before he's killed), the Champagne Bottle and the roses (found in the van by Mike covered in red glop).
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The characters all say the words "Come Back" when they talk on the walkie-talkies. This is also a clue and in particularly Gordon's case, to wake up and come back to reality from his sleepwalking state.
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The beginning of the film where we see Gordon sitting in the car staring at his wife inside his van is actually both the ending and the start of Gordon's both mental and physical breakdown that starts to take place after winning the bid from Griggs for the job.
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Mary Hobbes has four personalities as depicted on the Session recordings with the shrink that Mike listens to in the record's office. They are Billy, Princess, Simon and herself. This is quite similar to Gordon who you can infer that Phil, Mike and Jeff are his own living personalities and ultimately letting his own "Simon" becoming the dominant strong personalty as it happened to Mary.
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During the scene where Gordon is watching is wife and baby in the doorway while it's raining from inside his van, you can see a big silver pot on the kitchen stove with smoke coming out of it. This is how Gordon gets his leg burned with scolding water that you see him treating later on in the film in the van.
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When Gordon is controlled/possessed by Simon, one of Mary Hobbes alter egos, he is completely sleepwalking or under the control of Simon.
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When Hank (Josh Lucas) is clearing out the tunnels with the red goo, he notices a brick missing in the center of the wall as well as the one missing brick on the bottom depicting a Casino slot machine. He discovers in dirt on the bottom finds hundreds of old coins (silver dollars, gold and silver teeth, etc.) and the pincher used to perform lobotomy's which he starts playing with after finding it in a jabbing motion and later on is stuck in the eye with and eventually dies from the wound later in the film and used to kill McManus by Gordon.
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Every Session that Mike sneaks off and listens to in the Hospital channels the spirit of Simon more and more as The Phsychiatrist and Mary Hobbes' personalities start or refuse to talk about him and stranger things start to happen inside the hospital and the immediately affects Gordon who is the weakest one of the group emotionally and stressfully.
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The 9th Session which Mike plays on Thursday reveals the full spirit/personality of Simon in Mary Hobbes and him stating "that Mary needed him to be strong" and eventually kills Peter with the broken glass doll that caused the scars on her chest before the fire. This also completes Gordon's transformation into Simon as he kills Phil, Mike and Jeff within minutes of the tape's conclusion.
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The time line of events leading to Gordon's mental, emotional and physical breakdown is four days which is tied into Mary Hobbes who's patient room number in the hospital is 444 as well a her grave stone in which he is sitting next to which is down underneath the broken tree branch in the graveyard when he's trying to call his wife on his cellphone.
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When Phil calls Amy, his ex-girlfriend to find out where Hank had disappeared to, we never hear any of their conversation on their cellphone. This is also similar to when Gordon calls Wendy on the same cellphone and never hear her voice suggesting that Gordon was now completely mentally and physically impaired and was completely misunderstanding everything that Phil, Mike, Jeff and Hank, before's lobotomized were saying to him.
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Hank is the first one of the group to find a silver dollar coin inside the hospital dated from 1883. Later on in the film, Phil ends up with the same coin and uses it flip against Mike as two gets to get lunch that day (Thursday) and Gordon who had questioned Phil as to where he had gotten the coin, eventually sees the same coin on the floor near the window where the wounded Hank was standing where Jeff saw him bleeding. This was a clue of the order whoever found or saw the coin would end up being killed by Gordon because Phil would be killed with his own box-cutter inside Mary Hobbes' room not long after Phil finds a dying Hank in the tunnels.
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In the beginning of the film as Gordon and Phil are driving to the Hospital, Gordon looks at it as if he had been there before.
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The end of the film, Gordon is seen in Mary Hobbes room for the very last time standing in front of a mural of his own pictures of his baby's christening that feature his wife, Phil, Hank and Mike with blood smeared over them. This is a similar mural to that in the opening of the film where Griggs is showing the rooms to Phil and Gordon on their way out of the hospital which belonged to Mary Hobbes.
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In one of the faded mural pictures in Mary Hobbes room on the wall is a picture of her that looks more manly than feminine. It almost looks similar to Gordon's facial structure. You can also infer that it was Simon under the guise as a younger version of Gordon himself.
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During the scene on the roof after Phil calls his ex-girlfriend Amy, Gordon violently grabs him and Phil utters "Are you going to hit me?" with Jeff and Mike looking on. This would pay off later as Gordon admits to Phil that he had hit his wife and as going to do something similar to Phil for walking away from him.
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During the lunch scene, Mike is goofing around with Jeff with a chop stick about how to perform a lobotomy. Gordon is watching intently along with curiosity along with Phil and Hank along side them. At the end Mike finishes his demonstration stating that the recommended treatment was sunglasses. The only character in the film that wears sunglasses is Hank and is a clue that he would be the first victim.
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After his argument with Phil on the roof, Gordon walks back inside and sits down in the stairwell looking at his fingernails which are covered in what appears to be blood. You can infer two things about this. One is that the wound on his left hand that he suffered on the first day opened up and got it on his fingernails while trying to clean it off. Or it is dry blood is from his attack on Hank the night before giving him the lobotomy in the tunnels.
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As the film goes on, Gordon's anger and aggression builds up more and more towards Phil in particular due to his irrational state as Phil tries to be the cool, calm peacekeeper that Hank had told Jeff earlier in the film Gordon was.
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During one of the sessions, Mary Hobbes asks the shrink "Why her family come and visit her?" which is the opposite of Gordon in that he was tired and "wanted to go home" to Wendy and baby Emma.
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Gordon tells Phil that he was staying in a Motel because he was kicked out of the house after the accident in his house which he hit his wife Wendy. We never see him going to, inside or coming from any hotel at any point in the movie. The hospital is where he appears to be staying in as evidenced by the attack on Hank, who had shown up Tuesday Night to get all the coins and valuables from the tunnel and leave the job behind.
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BODY COUNT: 7. Five of them on screen (Hank, Phil, Mike, Jeff and Craig) in the hospital. Two off screen (Wendy and Emma)
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Early in the film, Phil sees Gordon limping out of the van with Gordon stating that "he pulled a muscle or something". He would admit later on in the film to Phil that he had hit Wendy after the pot of pasta landed on his leg and burned with boiling water as well as the pot itself which was seen earlier behind Wendy as she's holding the baby in front of their house. You can see Gordon treating the burn with a bottle of iodine late in the film in his van which is parked in the parking lot of the Hospital late at night.
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In the documents Mike comes across Mary Hobbs diagnosis is D.I.D. In the time period of the tapes D.I.D was still labeled as Multiple Personality Disorder, it was not until 1994 they changed it to Dissociative Identity Disorder to accommodate the DSM-IV-TR (a mental disorder diagnostic guide).
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When Gordon is sitting in his van outside his house looking at the christening photographs, we can see in the background his wife Wendy and their daughter Emma both in the garden. We then cut to the garden and see Wendy picking up Emma and carrying her into the house. We then cut back to Gordon in his van looking at the photographs, just before he leans over to pick up his bag and leave the van you can clearly see Wendy through the window carrying Emma into the house for a second time.
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Peter Mullan kept forgetting to limp during his scenes resulting in many continuity errors. These are noted in the director's commentary as well.
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When Hank starts finding coins in one of the tunnels below the asylum he is wearing gloves. Then when he finds the second coin only a few meters further on his gloves are gone.
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A CVS brand baby wipe container is in clear view when we are introduced to Carusso and Mullen in the van. A few moments later the baby wipes container is turned sideways.
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At the very end of this movie there's a typo in the copyright notice. The word motion, as in motion picture, is spelled "motin".
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abandoned asylum|multiple personality|lobotomy|insane asylum|released in 2001 on usa|imaginary friend|gothic architecture|haunted house|romantic rivalry|death of co worker|uncle nephew relationship|medical records|security guard|mother daughter relationship|father daughter relationship|husband wife relationship|therapy session|danvers state mental hospital|bare chested male|false accusation|false memory|hearing voices|old dark house|supernatural horror|
Bulgaria (Bulgarian title): Сеан 9
Brazil: A Nona Sesso
Canada (French title): Session no 9
Denmark (video title): Ddens hospital
Spain: Session 9
France: Session 9
Greece (DVD title): To asylo tou tromou
Italy (DVD title): Session 9
Poland: Dziewiata sesja
Serbia: Sesija 9
Russia: ”ев‚а еи
Sweden (TV title): The asylum - Ddens salar
Turkey (Turkish title) (new title): Son Seans
Movie Details:
MOVIE
