Welcome to Creedmore: Population, Ghosts and Bad Writing
There are horror movies that make you afraid of the dark. Then there are horror movies that make you afraid of the rental counter, because you just wasted three dollars on them. Prison (1987), directed by future Hollywood loud-noise specialist Renny Harlin, is one of the latter.
Shot inside a real abandoned penitentiary in Wyoming, Prison had everything going for it: atmosphere, walls soaked with history, real inmates as extras, and a young Viggo Mortensen smoldering like a Marlboro ad. And yet, through some black magic more potent than the film’s ghostly antagonist, Harlin and his co-conspirators managed to turn it all into a dull, derivative mess.
This is not a horror movie. It’s a padded prison sentence with jump scares.
Plot: By the Numbers, With Shackles
The story begins in 1964 when Charles Forsyth (played by Kane Hodder, because Jason Voorhees wasn’t available for parole) is executed in the electric chair for a murder he didn’t commit. Cue lightning, cue doom, cue cliché.
Fast-forward to the 1980s. Creedmore Penitentiary, closed since the sixties, is reopened to house an overflow of inmates. Lane Smith plays Warden Eaton Sharpe, the same guard who supervised Forsyth’s execution and is now running the joint like a man who’s been constipated since Nixon resigned. His staff knows he’s corrupt, the inmates know he’s corrupt, and the audience knows he’s corrupt, because Lane Smith is chewing scenery like it’s his last meal.
Enter Burke (Viggo Mortensen), a brooding car thief with the face of a Calvin Klein model and the personality of wet cardboard. Burke and a fellow inmate crack open a wall in the basement and—oops—release the angry ghost of Forsyth, who immediately starts killing people in grisly ways. Suddenly, prisoners and guards alike are dying, but instead of leaving the prison (because that would end the movie in 30 minutes), everyone sticks around to be picked off one by one.
Death by Special Effects
This should be fun. It’s a ghost slasher movie in a prison. What could possibly go wrong? Oh right—the execution.
The kills are there, but they’re about as scary as a haunted house attraction run by your local Elks Lodge. Prisoners combust, get impaled, or are electrocuted, but it all feels like a greatest-hits reel from better horror movies. Forsyth’s spirit doesn’t stalk or terrify—he just kind of… happens. Imagine Casper the Friendly Ghost with anger issues and you’ve got the vibe.
Even Kane Hodder, the stunt legend himself, is wasted. He’s buried under makeup and reduced to lurching around while Harlin yells “More fog! More lightning!” behind the camera.
Lane Smith: Warden of Ham
Let’s talk about Lane Smith, because the man gives the kind of performance usually reserved for dinner theater. As Warden Sharpe, he growls, snarls, sweats, and grimaces like a man auditioning for “Most Corrupt Authority Figure in a Horror Film.” He’s guilty, he’s haunted, and he’s somehow even less subtle than the giant neon “electric chair” prop.
Smith plays Sharpe with all the nuance of a cartoon villain. He might as well be twirling a mustache while screaming, “Yes, I framed him, and I’d do it again!” It’s almost admirable how much energy he pours into a script this lifeless. Almost.
Viggo Mortensen: The One That Got Away
Watching young Viggo Mortensen in Prison is surreal. He broods in the corner, smokes, and occasionally swings a wrench. He’s clearly more handsome than everyone else onscreen, and the camera knows it. The problem is, his character is so underwritten he might as well be named “Generic Inmate #4.”
It’s tempting to imagine what Viggo thought during filming. “One day,” he probably muttered between takes, “I’ll ride a horse in The Lord of the Rings. Until then, I’ll stand in this Wyoming prison pretending to be scared of dry ice.”
Chelsea Field: The Token Reformer
Chelsea Field plays Katherine Walker, a corrections official whose job is to wander around saying things like “This isn’t right” and “We need to reform the system.” She is, of course, ignored. Her role is the horror-movie equivalent of a “Wet Floor” sign: technically useful, but easy to overlook when the real action is happening elsewhere.
Her character’s main function is to remind the audience that someone, somewhere, thinks this movie is making a point about the prison-industrial complex. It isn’t.
Renny Harlin: Future Blockbuster, Present Disaster
Renny Harlin went on to direct Die Hard 2 and Cliffhanger, proving he knows how to blow stuff up. But here, in his American debut, his main trick is cranking up the smoke machine. Every scene looks like it was filmed inside a meat smoker. Lightning flashes, walls drip, chains rattle—and yet there’s no atmosphere, just noise.
Harlin directs horror like a man who doesn’t understand suspense. Instead of tension, he gives us repetition. Instead of dread, he gives us smoke. By the third act, you’re not scared—you’re wondering if the fire alarm went off in the projection booth.
Production Trivia: More Interesting Than the Film
The making of Prison is more compelling than the movie itself. It was shot in a real abandoned penitentiary in Wyoming, with actual inmates used as extras. Imagine being a convicted felon and being told, “Hey, want to spend your day pretending to be in prison for a horror movie?” That’s not irony—it’s exploitation.
The production also damaged the historic site because they were given free rein to drill holes and knock down walls. So not only is the film forgettable, it also vandalized history. Double feature it with a documentary about prison reform and you’ll feel like you’re committing a crime just watching.
Box Office: Dead on Arrival
With a budget somewhere between $1 and $4 million, Prison grossed a pitiful $354,704. That’s not just a flop—it’s a death sentence. The only thing scarier than Forsyth’s ghost is Empire Pictures’ balance sheet. When your horror movie makes less than a regional bake sale, it’s time to admit the execution failed.
Why It Fails
Prison fails because it doesn’t commit to being anything. It’s not scary enough to be horror, not smart enough to be social commentary, not thrilling enough to be action, and not sleazy enough to be fun exploitation. It exists in cinematic purgatory, a film trapped between genres like one of its own inmates stuck in solitary confinement.
Final Verdict
If you want to watch a prison horror movie, there are better options. If you want to see Renny Harlin before Hollywood gave him helicopters to crash, this is technically that. If you want Viggo Mortensen, watch The Prophecy or A History of Violence.
Prison isn’t the worst movie ever made—it’s just aggressively mediocre, the kind of film you forget while you’re still watching it. The scariest thing about it is how much potential it wastes.
