Netflix Movie Review: Asylum (1997)

In continuation of our series on scouring the limited selection of Netflix Instant, today's review is about a movie called Asylum, which is the tenth result on IMDB if you type in the title. This movie came out in 1997 and features Robert Patrick, who played the scariest villain ever in Terminator 2: Judgment Day and is Colonel Ryan on one of my all-time favorite shows, The Unit; I decided to give this one a shot. It was better than expected, despite the mediocre rating given to it by IMBD viewers. I think we tend to judge movies relatively, and relative to Netflix Instant standards, Asylum is worth watching if one is looking for a mild thriller/mystery. It really is nothing special, but I think it gets the job done of being an averagely okay movie. Perhaps my sense has been tainted by watching various crappy movies on Netflix (expect to see an "Avoid List" soon. The inaugural nominees include Take Me Home Tonight, anything listed under Romantic Comedies, and others one could avoid just by looking at the title). This one involves a private detective who struggles with depression from childhood trauma. He goes undercover inside a mental asylum to investigate a death (I find it a particularly intriguing setting. Who didn't like Shutter Island?) It turns out to be an amusing mystery.

 One of the things I wished were explored more deeply in the film was the protagonists struggle with depression, as that seems to be heavily part of the theme at the beginning but later is somewhat forgotten. As for the plausibility of the story, I am unsure, as my experiences in mental institutions and pharmacology are limited. But I found it worth watching, and I hope my few words on it give the reader a reasonable expectation of what it offers.