State Hospital’s star turn
Interior and exterior of Allentown location get lot of screen time.
For the shuttered Allentown State Hospital, it’s a role the historic property was meant to play.
The hospital is transformed into Philadelphia’s Raven Hill Memorial Psychiatric Hospital in “Glass,” the latest film by celebrated director M. Night Shyamalan. The film opened nationally Friday with some theaters showing it in a preview night Thursday.
Allentown State Hospital, from nearly every angle, has almost as much screen time as the film’s stars, which include Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson and James McAvoy, all of whom were spotted around Allentown during filming in the fall of 2017. All but about 30 minutes of the just-over two-hour film is set in the hospital. Those in the Valley
who grew up near the hospital or worked there until the hospital closed in 2010 have been eagerly awaiting the film to see how the hospital was used in filming.
“Glass” is a sequel to 2000’s “Unbreakable” and 2016’s “Split.” The comic-book thriller is expected to take in at least $50 million over its opening weekend — but that figure could be much higher, even as high as $75 million, according to www.deadline.com. If “Glass” hits $75 million, that would put the film as the second highest opening on Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend behind 2015’s “American Sniper.”
In “Glass,” Willis returns as David Dunn, the green-hooded vigilante The Overseer, who’s searching for four teenage girls who have been kidnapped by The Beast, one of 24 personalities of Kevin Wendell Crumb (played by McAvoy).
Dunn, who we first met in “Unbreakable,” has superhuman strength and the ability to use his sense of touch to discern if someone has committed a crime. Dunn first learned of his powers after surviving, completely unharmed, a train crash that killed all the other passengers.
In “Split,” we met Crumb, a Philadelphia Zoo employee with dissociative identity disorder who kidnapped three girls and trapped them in the basement of a zoo building. Only one of the girls, Casey Cooke (played by Anya Taylor-Joy) survives. We learn that the most frightening and powerful personality in Crumb is The Beast, who has superhuman strength and can bend the laws of gravity, including being able to scurry along a wall vertically.
In both films we see Elijah Price, aka Mr. Glass (played by Jackson), the devious puppet master manipulating them both.
“Glass,” which was also shot partly in Philadelphia, opens with scenes set in what looks like several typical Philadelphia neighborhoods (maybe Kensington or South Philly?). Dunn and his son, Joseph, run a home security store as Dunn patrols as The Overseer.
After a titanic clash between Dunn and Crumb, they are both taken to Raven Hill under the direction of the seemingly-kindbut-mysterious Dr. Ellie Staple (Sarah Paulson), who’s specialty is dealing with patients who have delusions that they are superheroes.
It’s here, about 20 minutes into the film, that we first see Allentown State Hospital in a beautiful exterior shot of the property’s rolling green lawn and stately front entrance. The film was shot there in the fall so the hospital is surrounded by autumn color. At several points in the film, the hospital’s exterior shots (day and night) feature a Philadelphia skyline, added in post-production, as “Glass” is set in Philadelphia. (Those effects, both interesting and jarring, were created by visual effects supervisor Ed Mendez, a Bethlehem native.)
At this point in the movie, the hospital shines as an understated “character.” As Raven Hill, the hospital is an institution that radiates peaceful, historic beauty on the outside but, inside, has a host of state-of-the-art technology and eerie, even horrifying activity (cue scratchy violins.)
Characters are housed in sterile pale gray or white patients’ rooms. Of course, the rooms are no ordinary patient rooms. Dunn’s is booby-trapped with pipes that can quickly flood the room with water, Dunn’s kryptonite, so to speak. Crumb’s room is outfitted with sensoractivated bright lights that flash and force him to abruptly change personalities.
There are many scenes in hallways, and each hallway features a unique architectural element, such as an arched window over a doorway or protective large metal gates. You see isolation rooms, a patient storage room, a control room with cameras and a main office used by doctors and administrators (and in this film, Staple). Scenes were also shot in the hospital’s basement, which feature large wooden doors, and tunnels that lead outside.
A major scene in the movie takes place in the hospital’s day hall, a Pepto-Bismol pink room with large windows and high ceilings. We see all three characters, drawn together to talk with Staple, who seeks to convince them that their “powers” can be explained by science and that comic books are just fiction.
The film’s climax takes place outside the hospital and you see the main building and grounds. Philadelphia police respond, another jarring thing to see because this is really Allentown.
Shyamalan, who shows his love for his home state of Pennsylvania by filming all his projects here, captures the eerie beauty of the hospital. The credits for the film include a thank you to the Allentown and the city police department.
For Shyamalan’s devoted fans, “Glass” is likely to be a hit, the final installment to the trilogy that began 19 years ago. For everyone else, “Glass” is the dark, creepy antithesis of the Marvel/DC comic movie, lacking the over-the-top action or side-splitting humor.
For the Valley, “Glass” is both a rare opportunity for us to see inside Allentown State Hospital and an opportunity to shine Hollywood’s spotlight on a truly beautiful historic property.
jsheehan@mcall.com Twitter @jenwsheehan 610-820-6628