Asylum

Production

Paramount Classics released Asylum in August 2005. The screenplay was adapted by Patrick Marber and Chrysanthy Balis from Patrick McGrath’s 1996 novel of the same name. David Mackenzie directed Natasha Richardson, Marton Csokas, Ian McKellen, and Hugh Bonneville in a period English asylum.

Story

In 1959, Stella Raphael moves with her husband Max into staff quarters at a high-security English psychiatric hospital. She becomes drawn to a charismatic but dangerous patient, the sculptor Edgar Stark, whose history of jealous violence is well known to the hospital’s superintendent.

Reception

Asylum received mixed reviews but was praised for Natasha Richardson’s performance and for its faithfulness to Patrick McGrath’s psychologically dense novel. It was among the last collaborations between Richardson and screenwriter Patrick Marber before her 2009 death after a skiing accident.