I'm already on the record as considering Brad Anderson's Session 9 one of the great underrated horror films of the Aughts - I named it #7 on my "7 Scares, 7 years" countdown, ya know - but what I haven't given credit to is the really lovely cinematography by Uta Briesewitz (A woman! Imagine that!).You might already know that Session 9 was one of the first feature films shot on HD video (Well IMDb says "one of," but I swear it was The first) a la the Star Wars prequels or Michael Mann's last several films. And while it might not match the majesty of Mann's images, I think it uses the technology wonderfully - there is a terrible weight to the air in the film, as if everyone is smothering. It's as if you are breathing in the asbestos with the workers; every mote in the air seems to hover on the screen. The movie obviously benefits from having such a phenomenal location as the Danvers State Mental Hospital, but Anderson and Briesewitz's shooting of it is ace. As always, click any of these examples to embiggen...
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I need to give this one another shot. I wasn't impressed when I first saw it, but I loved Anderson's MOH entry "Sounds Like" and I finally got around to seeing "Transsiberian" and loved it too (although it's hard to say how much of my opinion was influenced by Thomas Kretschmann's presence).
"Session 9" is one of my favorite movies ever, I just love it. Funny enough though, I kind of hated Anderson's MOH episode, but I did love "The Machinist" so I still consider myself a fan of his.
You know they tore Danvers down, right? Such a shame, it would have been cool to visit.
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