This week American Horror Story returned (to record-shattering numbers) for a new season of insanity - set, appropriately enough, in a sanitarium for the criminally insane. Insane asylums have been hotbeds of movie drama for decades, and bring with them their own set of tropes, cliches, and plot devices. We've compiled a few of our favorite asylum fixtures here, and the film that we feel did each the best.
Best Hallucinations: A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors
You gotta give it to Freddy and Co. for pulling out all the stops in this truly twisted and beloved postmodern slasher classic. Philip's puppet death and the Zha Zha Gabor and Dick Cavett cameos make this one tops for pure WTF? hallucinatory imagery.
Best "Welcome to the Asylum" Speech: Twelve Monkeys
If I ever get committed to a mental institution, I want Brad Pitt to be my orientation advisor. This scene where he gives Bruce Willis the rundown on how things work in the loony bin is priceless, and some of the best work he's ever done.
Best Drug-Induced Insanity: Bad Dreams (1988)
Gay director Andrew Fleming would get real attention for later films like The Craft, Dick, and Hamlet 2, but his first feature was a delightfully nasty little asylum-set horror flick that made surprisingly good use of setting, sleight-of-hand, and Susan Ruttan. Here's the trailer:
Most Horrifying Lobotomy: Session 9
While director Brad Anderson is best known for his quirky romantic comedies, he NAILED the horror genre with this low-fi but extremely creepy haunted asylum tale starring Josh Lucas, David Caruso, and Brendan Sexton III. It also features the most horrifying frontal lobotomy I've ever seen outside of my own living room. Here's the trailer:
Best "The Inmates Are Running the Asylum!" Twist: *SPOILER*: Don't Look in the Basement
This awesome 1973 low-budget thriller packed a heck of a punch with its twist ending - but the rest of the film's pretty fun, too.
Worst Escape: Girl, Interrupted
When Lisa (Angelina Jolie) and Susanna (Winona Ryder) escape from the institution, they crash at the house of Daisy (Brittany Murphy), a former inmate who was recently released. Lisa then picks on Daisy until she kills herself. And you thought YOUR houseguests were rude? Sheesh.
Most Disturbing Shock Treatment: Shock Corridor
This 1963 drama from Samuel Fuller is a seriously disturbing flick - a journalist (Peter Breck) has himself committed in the hopes of winning a Pulitzer for blowing the lid off of a murder at the asylum, and is in turn given shock treatment and losing his damn mind. (Shades of Lana's arc on American Horror Story, perhaps? Let's hope not, for her sake.) While ostensibly a B-picture thriller, Corridor tackled racism, the treatment of veterans, and much more while still delivering some seriously disturbing imagery and emotional punch - definitely worth tracking down if you haven't seen it.
Nastiest Caregiver: One Flew Over the Cuckcoo's Nest
Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher) will forever be the biggest, baddest, ballsiest bad guy of all time. That is, until next week's American Horror Story, where Jessica Lange is clearly gunning to knock Ratched off her perch.
Best Airborne Body Fluid: The Silence of the Lambs
In the premeire episode of AHS: Asylum, Sister Whoopsies Eunice gets poo flung in her face by Kelly Ripa's husband. Pretty nasty, but I gotta give the award for Best Airborne Body Fluid to Miggs from Silence. He said he could smell your WHAT, Jodie?! I don't think he was referring to her L'air du Temps...
Best Musical Number: It's Kind of a Funny Story
Not all movies set in insanse asylums are horror movies, or even scary. This sweet and unexpectedly touching 2010 coming-of-age story involves a young Brooklyn man (played by United States of Tara's Kier Gilchrist) who inadvertently has himself committed after telling a psychiatrist that he thinks he is suicidal. Once in the asylum he learns that his depression - while very real - pales in comparison to the problems of the other inmates, including a friendly but unstable schizophrenic played by Zach Galifianakis. The film's emotional centerpiece is a music therapy class that leads to a brilliantly epic fantasy performance of Queen and David Bowie's "Under Pressure" that actually brought tears to my eyes.
