User reviews

People in an old abandoned asylum ? Going crazy ? Dying ?

We've already seen it all before, and this time, although the production and cast are decent (the overall sound design is actually quite good despite too many squishy noises), I just can't help but think of Brad Anderson's excellent (if flawed in its own ways) "Session 9". Way better.

Sorry, but since braincells don't work on cash, a low budget doesn't excuse a poor script.

So let's make it short : if you want gore & predictable "twists" you might enjoy this one ; if you'd prefer a better film go for "Session 9". My vote is 3 out of 10, however totally unreasonably raised to a 5 due to Matt Berry's appearance (I'm a Boosh fan), and Zoe Keating's beautiful score.

This British horror film is unusual in a few aspects. It starts by showing the end (or is it?) of the story. It has the main character, Nick, as a narrator, who's more often a commentator who hits the pause button (freeze-frame) when he makes a comment. Nick is considered criminally insane because of the way his lover died 4 years ago in an abandoned asylum, but Nick insists it was due to supernatural causes (involving a weird chair). Early in the film, Nick admits he can be the only one who did it although he doesn't remember doing it. An old professor, his assistant and two students have the "genius" idea to bring back the supposedly criminally insane Nick to the asylum where the murder was committed, to study him. Right there, I had a problem believing such a dumb idea could actually happen.

The "devil's chair" in the abandoned asylum is a sinister-looking chair with a skull, initially inoffensive, which "probes" people (creepiest effects of the movie) before shunting them off to another version of the asylum with a demon-skulled tentacled monster roaming. I thought sometimes it looked freakish, sometimes amateurish. The acting was unequal, but I think it might have been intentional. The pompous old professor was atrocious in his line delivery. The main character/narrator was actually good playing it serious, troubled, intense, sometimes mean, channelling Jason Statham. The others were OK, except the brown-haired assistant that was also bad, but nowhere near the level of the professor. There were jarring changes in the tone of the movie with the main character actually admonishing the viewer once. The "normal" version of the asylum was undermined by the irrational, sometimes corny, behaviour of the characters, which in a way got eventually explained. The "other" version of the asylum was sometimes unnerving with interesting cinematography.

However, it's the last act (last 20 minutes or so) that was really horrifying with its final twist that I liked but that might frustrate others. For low-budget horror, it does try to be somewhat different but ends up a mixed-bag. I wondered what messages the creators were trying to convey if anything. One of them might be that the true horror doesn't lie in supernatural shenanigans but in the human psyche. Another might be simply what the main character spews out angrily at the viewer near the end. I don't think I particularly liked this movie, but I found it positively peculiar nevertheless.

Rating: 6 out of 10 (Good)

I do appreciate the effort but a pair of suspenders have more suspense than this rotten egg of death. The story evolves around an evil chair adorned with a skull and placed conveniently (probably by some deranged carpenter) in a desolate building, a former asylum. To top it off the main character - a mental patient - continuously delivers a voice-over with a lisp which I believe he suffers from, listening to which is as thrilling as a boat ride on dry land.

Believe me you've seen it done before and better (Session 9 anyone?), don't punish yourself by watching the "Chair". I dosed off countless times which was about the most refreshing thing about the whole experience.

The Devil's Chair is not what it seems. This alone should intrigue most and it succeeds in pulling off a kind of fun scam. Add all the trappings of British sophistication and wit, throw in some Lovecraft and Barker (there's even a little Kubrick) and stir slowly. The film spins many of horror's classic scenarios and weaves them together to fool the viewer. An insane man who may not be crazy played (very, well) by Andrew Howard is taken by a team of psychiatrist/investigators back to the scene of a death that may have been murder, or some sort of supernatural occurrence having to do with a bizarre chair. The scene happens to be a spooky old abandoned building that morphs throughout the film to suit a variety of atmospheres. Totally empty, filled with decayed equipment, surreal alternate reality and finally,.... The Devil's Chair is several films rolled into one and for all it's far-fetchidness, it comes off well. I had high hopes at the beginning, some doubts toward the middle, then BOOM, satisfaction. The film manages to be light and almost funny in the midst of it's scares. I'd recommend this to horror fans, but be warned, this movie is like a magic trick, try not to get fed up with it and stop halfway through.

I just got back from seeing this movie at the TIFF and I will start out by saying that if you are the type of person who likes to have everything clearly spelled out for you in a movie, this film is not for you. Likewise, if you are looking for a non-stop gorefest, you are likely to be disappointed. All of that aside, I thought the movie to be very interesting and certainly worth the watch. I've never been a fan of movies with narration, but this one executes it quite nicely. The narrative dialogue is witty and often injects a bit of humor into the film. The main story follows a man (Nick) in a mental facility for the criminally insane after he and his girlfriend enter an abandoned asylum and she dies. Nick insists that she was taken by a demonic chair. 4 years later, a doctor has him released, so that Nick, the doctor and his team can explore the scene of the murder and thing quickly go down hill from there. The cinematography in this film is interesting and the sound effects give the movie a lot more edge considering the gore is minimal aside from the liberal use of blood. Overall, this movie was definitely worth watching and I look forward to its release on DVD so I can watch it again!

I only bought this film because it was on sale for £3, I didn't expect much from it but strangely I enjoyed it. That's not to say I thought it was a good movie, to be honest I thought it was a pretty bad movie but I still got a kick from watching it.

I think as long as you don't expect a brilliant plot, you can enjoy this film. There's a couple of overblown gore scenes but it kinda feels like a cheap 80's horror film which, if you're a fan of those, is nicely nostalgic.

Because they haven't over thought the plot in an attempt to seem clever, you can tell what's going to happen from about five minutes in, but the acting in the film is surprisingly decent & the effects are pretty good to boot. I liked it a whole lot more than the likes of 'Shrooms' but then this film was never going to be as good as 'Severance'. Although if you consider they only had 2 weeks to prepare this film, with only 3 days to write the script, then they did a great job.

I'll be interested in seeing the other films these guys have made to see if they can do any better.

Stoned idiot and his hot girlfriend break into an abandoned insane-asylum, take a hit of acid and then decide to have sex while sitting in a demonically possessed electric chair (!) Said chair then comes to life(! again) and burns the hell out of the girl, as the excuse for disgusting effects. Four years later, we see this stoner, now being released from a hospital for the criminally insane and forced to return to the scene of the incident by a Cambridge doctor who arranged his release, Dr Willaird, who looks like a cross between older Sean Connery and Mick Fleetwood, with a bit of Christopher Lee thrown in.

Melissa (Louise Griffiths) and Rachel (Elize du Toit) are hot; and the rambling, stream-of-consciousness voice-overs of the lead actor are amusing to a point, but too much contempt for the audience quickly becomes tiresome. Everything else about this fourth-wall-breaking commentary on people who watch horror flicks to see gore and mayhem is either pretentious, overly gory, or just boring. And in the end, it tries to get away with its own nonsensical plot by claiming to take place in the twisted little mind of its lead character. But the producers claim that they left the film up to people to interpret their own answers. No, you put out a film which makes little sense and tried to put it off on us, the viewers, to make sense out of it.

F*ckin' yawn.

STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning

Reckless Nick West (Andrew Howard) takes his girlfriend to an abandoned warehouse to drop acid, but when she sits on a weird chair, she is sucked into a demonic hole, leaving Nick traumatized. Years later, he's in a psychiatric hospital run by Dr. Willard (David Gant) who is the first person to give his story any credence. He offers him escape from the asylum if Nick returns with him to the scene of the mystery to conduct an experiment. But as members of the group go missing, it becomes clear something evil is lurking in the walls of this eerie place...

When I first caught sight of this bizarre looking straight to DVD horror film, I soon cleared the sight of it from my mind, but finding it again in the bargain bin at Morrison's, I thought...why not give it a try? While I don't feel I completely wasted my time, it does feel like a wasted opportunity in a lot of respects.

Adam Mason's film is unsure whether it wants to play as a straight out mind fu*k, gore porn horror flick or a self referentializing parody of the genre, with the lead character giving voice overs saying how we'll like it 'if we saw Hellraiser or Pumpkinhead' and at one point lamenting what 'a poorly written, badly acted' film it's become, either the way the writing feels uncertain of itself and in turn loses the audience a bit. The gore factor really kicks in at the end, shocking even by horror standards with all the blood/distress on display. Either way, you're more likely to sit lost on The Devil's Chair than be on the edge of it. **

If you have absolutely nothing to watch on a lazy evening, you can watch it.

The major problem with the movie is too much reliance on dialogues. It is ok for a movie to be driven by dialogues, but the quality of dialogue should be at least average. Here the dialogues are poorly written and for some reason the writer / director thought that using the F or C word every minute makes for good dialogue.

Another major problem the movie is that it is extremely slow paced, and by slow paced I mean just slow. It does not add any quality to the movie. This is not a slow burner, it is just slow, because probably the director had make the movie of at least a certain length!

If you listen to the lyrics of the song during the closing credits it says: "You must learn to love your demons and your demon's name is yours!"

Take this trip of a movie and you may discover the meaning of those words.

There is theatre in this movie that is definitely my way of thinking - and surrealism and eccentric imaginative villains, and an innocent way of telling a story that reminds me of "The Avengers" with Diana Rigg when she was at her most sexy and inspiring, and the witty and charming Patrick McNee; or perhaps, for another example of what I mean, "The Prisoner" with and made by Patrick McGoohan when he was dishy!

From such British 60's theatrical antecedents come the characters in this story - charming, theatrical, existential, seeking the meaning of their existence whilst trapped in a surrealist story - is it an adventure or a dream?!

"By the pricking of my thumb, something wicked this way comes!" ... what is it? What on EARTH!

Venture into the rabbit hole, but only if you are prepared for the butcher's knife when the plot turns sour. That's the only thing I didn't like. But I recognized the truth that was being expressed - "when the White Knight is talking backwards" is the White Knight really you? ... is it what it seems ... or is everything the reverse of however you think it is? Is the mad person sane and the sane person a demon? ... Or has the film-maker become lost in their own labyrinth of reversal-of-reality and turned the story into their own demonic reversal of the truth in one way, and the truth in another way?! If so, then it is the film-maker who has turned, in a final twist, insane and the movie become their demon that they do not love! Why, oh why, did the film-maker not embrace the reflective - reversed - or Looking-Glass "Gandalf the Wizard's" oh so important question: "Is the mad person sane" and, conversely - as implied, by the truth being the reversal, and in the consistency of a mirror's reflection - "Is the sane person mad"?!

But he copped out and semi-opted for the status-quo, nouveau-riche, family values view of "reality". He could have flipped-entirely, but unfortunately he lost his thread in the mirror-maze and couldn't get out again!

Im a huge horror fan and after watching this it left me feeling very uneasy towards the end it doesn't make sense none of it does but when you grasp the ending you begin to realize the devil chair/torture chamber wasn't real the entire movie was based on nick wests demented sociopathic mindset it was merely in his mind that was infact confirmed when the scene showed him kissing the student Rachel who resembled his first girlfriend only to realize she was not there thats when the movie is put in its true perspective that it was all in his mind that every scene was not real it has a clever story plot but the CGI monster wasn't scary at all and the gore seemed somewhat repetitive i give it a 3/10

Ex-mental patient Nick West (Andrew Howard) narrates the story (pausing every now and then to drop his two cents on the characters or to verbally berate the viewers of the film) of what happened when Dr. Willard, his colleague and 2 students bring him back to an abandoned asylum where Nick had seen his easy druggie girl die in a 'devil's' chair years before. Never a good idea and needless to say, it isn't too long before the spit hits the fan.

The film wasn't that original and hearkens back to hellraiser, Session 9, Pumkinhead, and a few others. However it was still a lot of fun to be had with the film and the performances for the most part were pretty good (the ones that weren't could very well have been by design). The ending could be seen coming by anyone paying attention, but it still seemed to pack a punch none the less. I'm glad I choose to view this even if it wasn't as good as Mason & Boyes previous "Broken".

My Grade: B-

DVD Extras: Commentary with Writer/Director Adam Mason & Writer Simon Boyes; a 57 and a half minute Making-of documentary; (the always annoying) corporate schilling for Blu-ray; and trailers for "Anaconda 3", "the Lazarus project", "Tortured", "Resident Evil: Degeneration", "Zombie Strippers", "Insanitarium", "Impact point", "the Tattooist", "Cleaner", "the Cottage", "Linewatch", "Burried Alive" Seasons 1-6 of "the Shield", & a promo for Fearnet.com

The main character of "The Devil's Chair" is a drug-dealer Nick West.He takes his girlfriend named Sammy to an abandoned asylum,when they discover the devil's chair which is the gate to the dimension of blood and despair.Sammy is brutally assaulted and killed by an unseen force,Nick becomes a suspect and is taken to the psychiatric ward.After four years he is released and joins Dr.Willard and his three companions to confront his demons where the supposed murders occurred."The Devil's Chair" is clearly influenced by Clive Barker's horror classic "Hellraiser".Like "Broken" the film is well-made and extremely unnerving.The way some sequences are shot will make your skin crawl.Some scenes are truly bloody and violent as all hell.The main demon of flies which smells blood looks impressive and very Lovecraftian.I can easily say that Adam Mason and Simon Boyes are the new masters of gruesome British horror.9 out of 10.

I have a lot of sympathy and respect for the duo Simon Boyes and Adam Mason, because they write and direct – at a relatively high tempo, I may add – horror films that are at least somewhat "wayward" without necessarily obeying to the public's mainstream demands of remakes, teen slashers and lousy sequels. Their movies certainly aren't groundbreaking or highly innovative, but they do appeal to die-hard and experienced fans of the genre because they're brutal, grim and thoroughly sinister. Their film "Broken" is still my favorite, as it's a rudimentary but very disturbing survival movie, and I really liked the quirky atmosphere of "Blood River". "Pig" I merely found a pointless effort and I haven't seen "Luster" yet. "The Devil's Chair" is a downright terrific movie throughout two-thirds of the running time! The film opens like an interesting throwback to old-school asylum horror and gradually shifts into a clever and ultra-macabre supernatural monster movie, reminiscent of the brilliant "Hellraiser" I & II, with extremely brutal violence and enormously grim set pieces. Adam Mason's regular lead protagonist Andrew Howard (who looks a lot like a lesser muscular clone of Jason Statham) stars as junkie Nick West who, together with his blond bimbo girlfriend intrudes an abandoned mental institution for a wild night of sex and drugs. The find a creepy death chair in one of the rooms and suddenly, without properly realizing what triggered it, the girl is trapped and tortured in the chair before vanishing entirely. With his criminal record and pockets full of dope, Nick naturally gets convicted for murder and, because of his crazy stories, institutionalized for four years. He's released by Dr. Willard and politely forced to return to the place of the horror, along with the Doctor himself and a couple of his students. Supposedly for a psychology study, but Willard actually other sinister things in mind, as he discovered that Nick spoke the truth and the chair is actually an invention from a formerly acclaimed scientist who created a device to separate the soul from the body. "The Devil's Chair" is tense, compelling and contains some of the grisliest ambiance and imagery that I've seen in the past decade. The asylum's interior truly looks nightmarish and also the titular chair is an effectively unsettling piece of scenery. When set in motion, it turns into a diabolical killing machine and I wouldn't advise squeamish people to watch that process. The acting performances are more than decent, the pacing is fast, and there are a few nifty details that also contribute to the entertainment value of the film, like Nick West's brief but often very witty voice-over narration in between the regular dialogs. It's a very good and horrifying horror flick with a plot, atmosphere and a fantastic monster to boot. But then … and I wish I didn't have to write these final words. The plot undergoes a very bizarre and abrupt metamorphosis and gone is all of a sudden the carefully built up intrigue and plausible morbidity. Did Boyes and Mason run out of inspiration? Where they bored and/or fed up with the direction the movie was heading? Did they want to do something totally unexpected and experimental? No idea, but all I know is that – for me personally – the movie suddenly lost all my admiration and praise. Perhaps it's just me and my miserable intellect, as I encountered several reviews stating that the twist was sheer genius. You decide.

I am a big fan of English film and have been excited by recent films like The Descent, and Dead Mans Shoes in the horror genre; and I hope that filmmakers with the sort of vision that makes these films possible get all the accolades and funding that they require to continue taking English film forward.

however, this film and its director Adam 'I'm a t**t' mason, makes me embarrassed to have been born in the same country. To say this film is conceited would be a massive compliment, it attempts the self aware horror take a la 'Man Bites Dog' where the protagonist psycho talks to the audience and even at one point says 'is this what you want, this badly written, terribly acted horror movie' or something of the sort and I agree whole heartedly. The acting is shallow, the 'big plot twists' are tedious and I found it difficult to care about the characters at all.

I implore that you do not watch this movie unless you are staving off suicide with terrible self involved movies