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Asylum

2005, Movie, R, 97 mins

Asylum: Review

ASYLUM
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David Mackenzie's adaptation of Patrick McGrath's modern-day Gothic melodrama is driven by the same volatile combination of sexual obsession and repressive social mores as Mike Newell's DANCE WITH A STRANGER (1985) and his own YOUNG ADAM (2003). Unfortunately, its mix of baroque plotting, awkward soft-core sex and a simmering violence never gels. 1959, England: Frustrated housewife Stella Raphael (Natasha Richardson) moves with her stuffy prig of a husband, Dr. Max Raphael (Hugh Bonneville), to the grounds of the Gothic asylum where he's just taken a career-advancing position. Stella doesn't love her husband, at least not enough to cut through the fog of depressed dissatisfaction that's settled over her life. She has a 10-year-old son, Charlie (Gus Lewis), but she's just going through the motions of motherhood. She doesn't read or have hobbies, except a little desultory gardening, and she finds the other doctors' wives, most some years her senior, vapid and irritating. So Stella drinks, smokes and imperils Max's career with her sharp tongue, provocative clothes and unsuitable friendship with jealous, manipulative Dr. Peter Cleave (Ian McKellen), who thought Max's new position should have been his. Cleave is especially fascinated by sex maniacs and other "extreme cases"; his pet patient, handsome sculptor Edgar Stark (Martin Csokas), murdered and mutilated his wife in a fit of jealous rage. Stella crosses paths with the brooding, sensual Edgar when he's assigned to a work detail in the Raphaels' garden — coincidence, or Cleave stirring things up? — repairing a delicate glass conservatory that's gone to crack and ruin. They begin an affair so feverish and indiscreet that it can only be described as mad, and Edgar's subsequent escape leaves Stella bereft. The rumors erode Max's professional standing, and there's worse to come: Edgar contacts Stella, and she abandons her family to live with him in hiding, staying even as signs of his madness begin to resurface. And there's more lunacy to come as the story wends its way to a diabolically symmetrical end. David Cronenberg's SPIDER (2002) perfectly captured the icy perversity that distinguishes Irish novelist McGrath's tales of madness gnawing at the fabric of everyday life. But here his inventions feel strained and cluttered with obvious ironies, starting with the fact that Stella is already half-mad with boredom before she ever sets foot in the asylum. The strong cast keeps the material from descending into sheer smutty tripe, but it's an uphill battle and in the end, not really worth their considerable efforts. leave a comment --Maitland McDonagh
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