Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #15297 in DVD
• Released on: 2006-01-30
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 99 minutes

Synopsis
Set in late-1950s England, David Mackenzie's ASYLUM is a Gothic romance filled with erotic obsession, deception, and murder. Natasha Richardson gives a bravura performance as Stella Raphael, an unhappy woman who is forced to move with her son, Charlie (Gus Lewis), to rural Yorkshire when her husband, Max (Hugh Bonneville), earns a post as deputy superintendent of a psychiatric institution for the criminally insane. Among the patients there is Edgar Stark (Marton Csokas), a brooding sculptor who has been imprisoned for the brutal murder of his wife. When Stark gets a job working in the Raphaels' garden and conservatory, the attraction grows between Stella and him as Stark's doctor, Peter Cleave (Ian McKellen), Max's rival, watches closely, harbouring his own ulterior motives. When Edgar escapes, Stella must decide whether to remain in her sedate life in Yorkshire or go after the dangerous man she has fallen in love with. Based on Patrick McGrath's 1997 novel, ASYLUM examines the fine line between marriage and passion, between the confined and the confused, as art and beauty combine with deceit and betrayal to tell a powerful story that features excellent performances by Richardson, McKellen, and Csokas, as well as fine support from Joss Ackland and Judy Parfitt. Maria Aitken, who just happens to be the wife of author McGrath, plays Claudia Greene.

Customer Reviews

"Give them up or don't come back"
Stella Raphael (Natasha Richardson) is a troubled woman. Repressed and bored, she's the long-suffering wife of a mental hospital's deputy director, Max Raphael (Hugh Bonneville). It's the late 1950s, and Stella's marriage to Max is a case study in dreariness and boredom. A puritanical psychiatrist, Max treats Stella like she's an undeserving servant, an excess piece of baggage there to fulfill Max's own whims.

Max has just landed an apparently cushy job at a British asylum outside London, and he expects Stella to not only fit in with all the other psychiatrist wives, but also do her best to make sure that his tenure at the hospital is made permanent. Their young son Charlie (Gus Lewis) gives Stella much pleasure, but there's still something missing in her life; it's just not enough to spend her days planning parties for the inmates and gossiping with her colleagues.

Her redeemer comes in the form of the enigmatic loony hunk Edgar (Marton Csokas), a sexy, handsome, brooding brute of a sculptor who once decapitated his wife for seeing other men. At first, Edgar helps Stella in her household chores, and becomes a playmate to young Charlie, but before long Stella is putting fresh lipstick on, swigging back the scotch for courage, and searching Edgar out for afternoon trysts in the rundown green house with hospital guards or family only scant hidden yards away.

The physical encounters are raw and sexual, with both of them unleashing all their bottled up frustrations and desires. Soon they are falling in love, both perhaps unaware that the affair can lead nowhere. Their fanatical obsession for one another soon gets the better of them, with Stella contemplating leaving her husband and child, while Edgar manages to escape, seeking refuge in the back alleyways of London.

Director, David MacKenzie follows Edgar and Stella as they progress in their affair that is so unlikely, but so well executed that it defies disbelief. Stella is formidably determined to attach herself to Edgar even though it means the end of her marriage, her relationship with her son, and her middle-class privileged life. But her nemesis ultimately comes in the form of Peter Cleave (Ian McKellan) a callous, snooping, and cleverly manipulative hospital administrator, who's on to Stella's affair with Edgar.

Stella's grim resolve to hook up with Edgar always seems to manifest itself at the wrong time and usually with the worse results, as she consciously embarks on a path of self destruction. Edgar is bad news, and Peter Cleave warns her about his penchant for violence, but there's little Stella can do to stop her runaway desires for him. She’s not an evil person, like the psychopathic Edgar, but her fate ends up being intertwined with the patient rather than Max, who later on reveals that he is not such a bad husband after all.

It is mostly the lovely Natasha Richardson who holds this movie together, as she tries in vein to be the dutiful wife, making a concerted effort to fit in, trying to extract a like-minded conformity, when all she really wants to do is cut loose and act out her inner sexual fantasies, involving sordid quickies with her new found love on the floor amongst the broken glass of the tumbling down hot house.

Based on the book by Patrick McGrath, the film is well acted – particularly by the hunky Csokas, as the brooding and virile Edgar - and it's tightly directed, but it doesn't totally capture the furtive and darkly psychological nature of its source material. Whilst the film is no doubt compelling, and some of it is down right hot, the lust is sometimes overwrought and the passion dynamics often contrived and it all ends up coming across as something resembling psychosexual Harlequin romance, It's like an entertaining and darkly ironic potboiler melodrama, with a lunatic hunk at its center. Mike Leonard January 06.

Asylum is a morbid, unsettling, and erotic film that you'll probably like
This film was recommended to me from Amazon because I'm also a fan of these types of movies. From "Basic Instinct" to "The Lover", these movies really intrigue me.This movie was directed by David Mackenize who also directed the overrated "Young Adam" which was cold and boring. "Asylum" on the other hand is a better achievement by the director. One of the factors that can add to the excitement and tension of the adulterous affair is the danger of being caught. Add to that, the fierce and idiosyncratic passion often attributed to artists. Then make the artist a raving psychopath and you have a pretty heady mix.

So finds the story of Asylum, your place into a world of sexual obsession, violence and madness. Stella (Natasha Richardson) is wearily married to Max (Hugh Bonneville), a psychiatrist working in a 1950s hospital for the criminally insane. He is overbearing to the point of being monstrous (by modern standards), joking to her about her being his 'pet patient' whilst expecting her to be a no-brainer wife who says the right things when introduced socially. In the initial build up, Mackenzie let's us see the smouldering lust in the face of inmate Edgar, who's incarcerated for murdering and decapitating his wife in a jealous rage. Just as he did with his previous movie, "Young Adam," Mackenzie excels at portraying barely sublimated animal sensuality, which soon bursts across the screen in a way that is at once base and beautiful. Helen knows how insane Edgar is, and her feelings for him, but she is gradually drawn into his web of madness, together with her son.

"Asylum" is visually appealing with it's dank, grey tones This film has it's explosions of repressed sexuality that is frightening in its force and surprising in its ending. Scenes of violence and sexuality make "Asylum" a film not for everyone. The R rating is not to be taken lightly, but it is a do not miss for anyone interested in a powerfully intense film that plumbs the depths of the human psyche. Natasha Richardson is fantastic as an ignored woman with a desire to be desired that wreaks destruction.

A downward spiral
Asylum has as hint of Lady Chatterley about it as bored housewife Stella realises that she's as imprisoned as the patients at the asylum her husband Max has started working for. Max is sure he is in line for the top job there, and Stella is expected to fit in, play the wifey role and maintain respectability.

Stella's passions are roused by long term patient Edgar Stark, he killed his wife, but being a former sculpter he is good with his hands, and they quickly establish a love affair which involves stealing dangerous moments together in the garden.

The film's strength comes from the fact that it doesn't fall into the trap of predictability; Stella, now in love with another man, and with a child in tow is surely destined somehow for a happy ending - after all she's only a victim of her own emotions.... but the film takes a grim turn and the romantic affair turns sour.

The film captures the erotic passions of the couple at the beginning of their relationship without ever becoming too absorbed in the sex. And as it continues the tension mounts and we are left with some poignant moments of sadness.

In a nutshell: This is a journey of a woman who who tries to add some zest to her dour existence, and ends up losing everything that meant anything to her. It's an interesting watch and all the parts are acted well, especially Natasha Richardson as Stella. I'd give this 3.5 stars if I could - although the film ticks many of the right boxes, it wasn't as compelling a watch as it should have been, and I'm unlikely to watch it again.