When asked what she was most looking forward to in retirement, Pauline Kael replied, No more Oliver Stone movies. If the late New Yorker critic had a beef with Platoon and Wall Street, you can imagine her displeasure at The Asylum Tapes (aka Greystone Park), whose sole novelty is that it marks the directorial debut of Stones son Sean. Its also the first found footage movie to feature an Oscar winner in a cameo. Two-time Best Director Oliver appears early on (as Oliver) to share ghost stories, but he makes zero attempt to prevent Sean (as Sean) and his film crew from going to The Haunted Asylum after midnight. Legend has it that anyone who goes inside will go mad, cautions a friend, so now the viewer knows they have to go there. Then theyll wander down dark corridors, swing the camera around as things go bump, shout What the hell was that? etc. etc. The price we pay for The Blair Witch Project keeps getting higher.
Ian Watson is the author of 'Midnight Movie Madness', a 600+ page guide to "bad" movies from 'Reefer Madness' to 'Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead.'
