Asylum

Strange film this.It starts with 2 editors trying to cut a horror movie from footage from a shoot in some fictional foreign country. What follows is that you see the entire horror movie with a Mystery Science Theater 3000 type comical voice over by the two editors. The film itself looks like a work-print with captions for missing effects etc. There's a couple of cuts to a side story with the editors but this probably only accounts for about 5 minutes of screen time. What ruins this film is the actual horror movie looks watchable whilst the editors are irritatingly unfunny. The production values in the horror movie seem quite decent whilst the editor sections are amateur hour. Its just a pity we couldn't see the horror movie and lose the editors voice over.

The plot

An eleven-person riot squad races to an insane asylum to quell a recent inmate outbreak and hostage situation.

They arrive, only to be caught off guard by a sudden barrage of insane patients.

When they've finally fought off a wave, two of their squad members are missing, their communications return only static, and the doors are locked.

They're trapped.

They break up into three teams to track down the lost members.

Strange sounds and religious iconography suggest something beyond insanity has taken over the inmates.

Sure enough, a simple rescue mission quickly morphs into relentless life or death battles with possessed.

When McGahey, a trained, rational hostage negotiator, discovers the ringleader of this possessed insanity is none other than his brother, it falls on him to stop nothing less than the opening of a portal to Hell.

This is one bizarre movie.

It's sort of like Mystery Science Fiction Theatre. Very hard to describe and follow.

It starts out with a priest and then cuts to these guys who appear to be editing or adding special effects to a movie.

The rest of the movie shifts back and forth between the asylum and voice over of these two editors making dumb funny comments about the movie which, BTW was supposed to be found footage, and the producer back in the US.

It's nearly impossible to watch. Nothing makes sense.

Stephen Rhea has really dropped into the abyss.

Words cannot describe how bad this movie is.

Whoever thought that turning bad movie into a good one by having two idiots talk continuously over what is happening on screen needs their head examined.

It's not funny, it's not horror, it's simply annoying.

Who else would make a film and then add on a couple of idiots talking about how bad it is? What is the point of that?

The original film was probably better than this version with a couple of idiots constantly criticising it .

This is one of the reasons I don't go to cinemas - to listen to other people talking while I'm trying to watch the film, no matter how bad it is.

I hope they made a huge financial loss on this garbage. And I hope the person who decided to add the two voices on top of the original film never works again.

Important note to potential film viewers of Asylum (2014): Before you watch this movie, learn about the history of Asylum. It is extremely important that you know the history of this movie before watching this movie.

On the Asylum IMDb message board, posters have provided links to various websites giving the story behind the movie Asylum. For instance, Comedy Film Nerds has a podcast where the original screenwriter for Asylum, Chris Mancini, talks about how After Dark Films managed to completely ruin the movie Asylum. If you go to the website Comedy Film Nerds, make sure you check out podcast 219 for the original story (the actual story starts at 34:20 of the podcast). You can search via the "keyword search" and type in 219. I also read that episode 242 has more information about the story behind Asylum but I didn't listen to that one. So I'll just give a quick rundown of the story of how After Dark Films thoroughly screwed up their own film Asylum: Chris Mancini manages to sell his script to the horror production company, After Dark Films. Then he pitches his proposal to be the director: he shows storyboards; gives information of crew members who are willing to work for a lower fee than normal (some of them somewhat well known); and runs down his idea of how to make the film work on time and within the budget. The After Dark folks say, "Thanks. We'll call you after we've made our decision." A short while later he gets a brief email basically saying, "Yeah, we decided to shoot in Bulgaria and go with a Bulgarian director and Bulgarian crew. I know you wanted it but we're going to do it this way. But we'll keep you in mind for any other projects in the future." That's it. He doesn't hear anything for around a year. Then he goes to a comic con in California and meets the After Dark people. They won't show him the movie, they will show him the trailer, however. He sees the trailer and thinks, "That doesn't look anything like what I originally wrote. But the trailer looked cool, nevertheless. So it looks like everything worked out okay." Time passes and out of the blue the After Dark producers call him up and ask him for a meeting. He says he'll be there. As he's on his way, the call back to confirm if he's going to show up. He says he will. Then, while he's driving to the studio, they call him again and ask if he's coming to the meeting. He's stunned. He thinks, "This is the third time they've called to make sure I'm coming to the meeting. If they have to confirm the meeting 3 times in one day, that must mean they're desperate to see me and something went wrong." He says he'll be there. But before the phone call ends they tell him to meet him at a local bar. Again, he's stunned but he says he'll be there.

When he gets to the bar he asks the After Dark producers what's up. They won't answer him. They continuously evade his question. They tell him to have a drink. No matter how many times he asks, they urge him to have a drink and evade his question. Only after he finishes two drinks do they tell him the truth: the movie is total garbage.

It turns out After Dark Films gave his script to one of their producers, told him to take it to Bulgaria and do what he could with it, and then let him have a free rein. Apparently, the producer completely chucked Chris Mancini's original script and made a completely new one. The only real thing that stayed in the new script is the title. The producer in Bulgaria made a completely unwatchable movie. When the people at After Dark Films saw it they were absolutely stunned. They had a deal with Lions Gate Films for Lions Gate to distribute their films and they couldn't give such an unwatchable movie to Lions Gate to be distributed. So they called Chris Mancini to rewrite it into a comedy. After seeing the unwatchable film, Mancini decides to turn it into an MST3K-style comedy because that's all he can do with the remaining few thousand dollars from the original budget.

So there it is, folks. The story behind Asylum and a little peek at the stupidity that goes on in Hollywood. After Dark Films is an utterly ridiculous film company. They used to have a festival called "8 Horror Films to Die For" but the films were so awful and so thoroughly trashed by the audiences that they stopped doing that festival and now put out fewer films since 2011. Their 2007 film "Captivity" managed to generate so much controversy and hate from feminists that Joss Whedon tried to get it banned from movie theaters. It's amazing how such a company can still manage to run. In fact, it's amazing how Hollywood still manages to run when you hear all the stories of thoroughly inept filmmaking that will make your jaw drop.

As far as the film Asylum goes, you should only watch it if you like MST3K and are willing to watch a movie inspired by it. The other reviewers didn't know about this film didn't know the story behind this movie before watching it. That's why they were completely perplexed and turned off. Knowing the story behind this movie makes it much easier to watch. I actually liked some of the jokes such as them calling Stephen Rea "lesbian Bob Dylan". If you're a fan of MST3K and have beer and potato chips, give this movie a shot. If not, then steer clear of this train wreck.

Called out to an insane asylum, a SWAT team and their lead negotiator manage to find themselves in a much bigger struggle than they expected when they find a possessed soul from their past catching up to them and must find a way of saving themselves.

This one wasn't all that bad of a horror parody that does have some solid moments to it. The film's central premise of the cutting crew watching the footage and then commentating on the material as a type of commentary track ripping and poking fun of the material present is quite funny and enjoyable for the most part, as once you get used to it there's plenty of great quips that emerge from their work. That they're kept off-screen and spend the majority of the time just doing quick little one-liners that poke fun of the situation in truly great manners with them pointing out absurdities in the story, riffing on the goofiness present and really just having a fun time ripping it to shreds in a really enjoyable manner. When they're not quipping at the movie, there's some more good fun to be had at the type of utterly cheesy type of film this originally was as the concept of the SWAT team sent to a rioted asylum and coming across a more supernatural presence than they expected which allows for the film to go for the crazy unbelievable type of set-ups that can't possibly happen in a real scenario as the sudden antics of the deranged, possessed individuals running around at inhuman speeds or jumping around for impossible abilities gives this a rather creepy vibe that makes for a typically creepy offering. There's a wide array of confrontations here that throw them into the fun action scenes of them finding the possessed maniacs in the asylum, the great series of pop-up attacks in the small rooms of the asylum or the big action scene in the boiler room where they encounter the possessed in the hallway for the shootout that turns out to be a ruse with the dead coming back under the possessed's command and then spilling the entire plot line gives this a rather enjoyable series of action scene here with a lot to enjoy. This one also manages to work out a solid finale that's even more fun with the fire-filled church and the gathered minions making for a wholly enjoyable finale that's really fun in a rather cheesy manner that gives this the biggest flaw overall. The cheesiness and utterly obvious low-budget attempt here on display is rather distracting rather than appealing when almost every scene is marked with what needed to be added to the finished scene that are so continuous and part of so many scenes here that it really doesn't get the full effect of what's going on. It just makes this feel all the more cheesy and corny that makes for a rather goofy time here beyond the film's running commentary vibe that runs throughout here that might turn some off completely. Otherwise, there's not a whole lot really wrong here.

Rated R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language and Brief Nudity.