August 11, 2005
By Matt Savelloni
“IT'S ONLY WHEN WE FEEL PAIN, OR THE PROSPECT OF IT, THAT WE START TO MAKE DISTINCTIONS BETWEEN RIGHT AND WRONG.” – Patrick McGrath
Patrick McGrath practices a form of neo-Gothicism that seems only possible from a scribe across the pond. Dank, dark, foggy, awash on the mores and unabashedly passionate, McGrath’s writing succeeds more on atmosphere than plotting. Nevertheless, ASYLUM offers the richest narrative in all of his works to date, a quixotic and bluntly sexual tryst played against a building tragedy that is damn near Shakespearean.
Stella Raphael is a city girl frustrated in more ways than one by her marriage to a bland psychiatrist named Max. Trapped in a degenerating high-security facility for the criminally insane, Stella is drawn to a haggard but enigmatic sculptor named Edgar Stark whose skills are being put to use to repair the hospital’s conservatory. Edgar was once a promising and still extraordinarily talented artist serving a life sentence for murdering and then mutilating his philandering wife. McGrath doesn’t waste time getting Stella and Edgar together, their immediate attraction tearing the tops off of their frustrated fervor. McGrath layers the suspense gradually but purposefully as their affair brings back not only Stella and Edgar’s spark of life but also the mad artist’s obsessive rage, setting ASYLUM on an inevitable path of baleful catastrophe.
“MOST OF US ARE DYING OF CHRONIC NEGLECT.” – Patrick McGrath
If sex sells, then dangerous sex compels. To view and comment on Stella and Edgar’s building fervor, McGrath employs a distanced, almost bemused narrative device that reminded me most of H.P. Lovecraft. ASYLUM is told from the point of view of another psychiatrist named Cleave (McGrath is nothing if not obvious in his choice of character names). This separation immediately cues the readers to the fact that we are watching an impending disaster, the players so imbued in their own passions that they cannot be trusted to offer their own perspectives; we are only treated to them via Cleave’s interpretations. But McGrath saves one great creep-out for the end and rather than risk spoiling any details, I will simply say that Cleave’s exit line not only provides a final skin-crawl but requires readers to re-examine his participation throughout the entirety of the novel.
In a more traditional novel by a more traditional writer (e.g., an American one), McGrath’s ASYLUM would be SILENCE OF THE LAMBS with Clarice Starling as Dr. Chilton’s jilted wife. And while Harris’ masterwork is a thrilling examination of pure good versus pure evil, McGrath is less interested in primal themes than he is in realistic scrutiny of damaged humanity. Stella, Edgar, Max and Cleave are not archetypes; they are believable souls besieged by internal and external demons. Even Edgar’s horrific acts—while never excused—are presented naturally. He is not the devil, or even Hannibal Lecter. He is simply a man: scary, horrifying, talented, captivating, loving, obsessive and compassionate. Reading ASYLUM is a cavalcade of emotions commensurate with such dynamism. McGrath might not be a beach read but his work is something that will stay with you long after the gates slam shut.
“AS A PSYCHIATRIST I WASN'T IN THE BUSINESS OF MORAL JUDGMENTS.” – Patrick McGrath
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I have always been a big fan of Natasha Richardson and not just because she is drop-dead gorgeous. I first took note of her in Ken Russell’s GOTHIC and realized that even in lesser efforts like PATTY HEARST, FAT MAN AND LITTLE BOY, THE COMFORT OF STRANGERS and THE HANDMAID’S TALE she was eminently watchable—always the hallmark of an actor with presence. Perhaps because of the poor performance of those films or perhaps because she was busy starting a family with Liam Neeson, Richardson suddenly slowed her output, downshifting to TV work, shallow independents BLOW DRY, CHELSEA WALLS and WAKING UP IN RENO and a second banana turn in MAID IN MANHATTAN. It’s great to see her back above the titles in a film like ASYLUM and in the upcoming pedigree project, THE WHITE COUNTESS from James Ivory.
David Mackenzie is a celebrated Scottish director who made the soft-porn-as-art-film YOUNG ADAM in 2003. Unabashedly erotic, that film promises that ASYLUM at the very least will not shy away from its blatant sexuality. As the driving component of McGrath’s novel, soft-soaping Stella and Edgar’s coupling would undermine the essence of the characters and the avalanche of emotions and actions resulting from it. These are not two people falling in love in the traditional, Hollywood sense, but two fragile souls looking for emotional uplift through physical connection. We are trained to believe that sex follows love when in reality, that equation is reversed. Mackenzie is just brave enough to allow that sentiment to breathe, hopefully allowing the term “adult film” to mean something other than cheap, debased tapes at the back end of the video store. We need more directors like Mackenzie if we are ever to return to an honest presentation of human sexuality on film. ASYLUM looks to be one of those perfect marriages of material and filmmaker.
“Sex is one of the nine reasons for reincarnation... the other eight are unimportant.” Henry Miller
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