Director Brad Anderson is drawn to distinctive locations. His Next Stop Wonderland used a transit stop as a metaphor for the search for love.

So imagine how his mind raced when he discovered the Danvers Mental Hospital, a century-old psych hospital near Boston mothballed back in the 1980s era of deinstitutionalization.
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The haunted house in the creepy horror film Session 9 is a gargantuan abandoned mental hospital.

The Danvers State Mental Hospital has been closed for 15 years. It can't be torn down because it has been declared a heritage building so the politicians have decided to renovate a portion of one wing and rent it out for office space. That means getting a clean-up crew in to remove all the hazardous wastes including ceiling and floor panels and insulation that contains asbestos.
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