Damaged-lonely souls crossing paths.. with neither capable of solving their individual problems, and so they must ultimately meet the same fate and ultimately crash and burn. She really did capture the screen with her incredible presence, with a timelessness that shall forever persist. Certain actors just exude that calm persona and inner and outer beauty so critical to numerous delicate roles. She was a very special individual and talent, and even if the whole world did not have the extended opportunity to share that revelation.. just watching certain of her works.. and those glimpses of wonder shine through. Forty-five when she passed away, we shall all be rediscovering her marvelous and indelible achievements for years to come.

There have been many films titled 'Asylum' over the years. At least one I can think of was pretty good. The 1972 film with Peter Cushing. Last night we watched one with that name from 2005 starring Natasha Richardson and Ian McKellen. It was listed as a 'Horror' film at Amazon Prime Videos and had a high rating. I would consider it more a steamy psychological drama than horror. As might be expected by the names involved it was well acted. The settings and visuals were well done too. The first one third of the film was promising. It's the story of a psychiatrist named Max that comes to work in a new position at large asylum for the mentally disturbed including the criminally insane. He brings along his seemingly bored wife Stella (played by the late Natasha Richardson) and young son. Ian McKellen plays Dr. Cleave, a long time doctor there that felt he deserved the position that Max was given. The wife (Natasha Richardson) soon falls for one of the inmates, Edgar. Edgar is a man who was found guilty in the murder and disfigurement of his former wife. Yes, what woman could resist such a tempting bad boy like Edgar, geesh. Soon Stella and Edgar begin an unlikely steamy love affair right under the nose of her husband, the guards and everyone else at the Asylum. This place has some security. They have steamy love making encounters right on the asylum grounds in places where he is doing jobs as a trusted inmate. Sometimes they just miss being caught on the grounds by a guard coming to check on him. It all becomes rather laughable the chances the wife takes. Still the first third of the film is intriguing and makes you wonder where it will all lead. Is Ian McKellen's character some how a part of all this? What part does he play in what's to come? Unfortunately the story soon turns into one where you do not care about a single character in the film with the exception of the little boy. The inmate soon easily escapes when he realizes he will not be released anytime in the near future. The wife finds shopping excursion excuses to go weekly into the city where she joins him at his hide out. Eventually Stella leaves her husband to be with Edgar, even though he is now jealous of her talking to other men and beats her regularly. The story goes even further downhill from there dragging on with more depressing and irritating developments. Finally at the depressing end we found ourselves asking ourselves why they turned such a promising drama into such a total mess. Don't bother watching this film unless you like depressing pointless movies with characters you eventually don't care about.

I was fascinated by this story about the thin line between "madness" and obsession (which anyone might experience), and the idea that falling in love with a dangerous person can lead you into tragic events, unless you are brave enough to choose a different path. Tragic characters nearly always make some mistake that then leads them into an inexorable downward spiral, and this was no exception. I felt that Natasha Richardson's Stella was a tragic character and her liaison with Edgar was a dangerous step - once she became involved with him, she was effectively trapped. The parallels between the asylum and the people imprisoned there physically and Stella's imprisonment in her marriage were very effective and the tension of events which were quite unexpected made this a compelling tale. I was suspicious of the motives of Ian McKellen's character right from the start, and I believe that his intentions were manipulative and selfish throughout. Stella and Edgar acted according to what they thought was their own free will and yet somewhere they were being controlled. It was a scary insight into how powerless people could be when falling into the clutches of mental asylums, either as a patient or someone on the periphery. I recommend this thriller with the warnings that others have made over the sexual content which is essential to portray the obsessive and passionate relationship at its centre.

In the 50's, the psychiatrist Max Raphael (Hugh Bonneville) is hired to work as superintendent of an asylum in the outskirts of London, and he moves with his wife Stella Raphael (Natasha Richardson) and their son Charlie (Gus Lewis). Stella has a passionless marriage and is ignored by Max; her boredom changes when her son befriends the handsome inmate Edgar Stark (Marton Csokas), an sculptor that in a crisis of jealousy had killed and disfigured his wife, and that is treated by Dr. Peter Cleave (Ian McKellen), an ambitious psychiatrist that aspired Max's position. During the afternoons, Stella has a hot adulterous affair with Edgar until the day he escapes and their affair is discovered. Stella has to take a decision between her family and her wild passion for Edgar."Asylum" is a sort of combination of "Madame Bovary" with "La Ragazza di Trieste", telling the wild and tragic passion of an ignored and bored woman and her descent into a hell life with a madman. The narrative is sexually tense, and the still sexy Natasha Richardson has a fantastic performance in the role of a woman that becomes obsessed by her destructive desire. Her chemistry with Marton Csokas is amazing, combining tension, madness and eroticism in a stylish cinematography. My vote is seven.Title (Brazil): "Paixão Sem Limites" ("Passion Without Limits")