Neil Welch This is an interesting movie.To start off with, let me say that the cookie-cutter plot - essentially this is about mysterious deaths taking place in a haunted prison - is poorly executed, the script is not very good (with masses of unresolved plot points, inconsistencies etc.) and cast of largely unknown actors contain some individuals who are not very good.And then it turns out to be made by someone who clearly believes he is making a movie which is about ten grades of quality above its actual level. This thing is well made, with a sense of visual style, special effects which are clearly low budget but nonetheless effective.Unfortunately, it is fatally hobbled by the lacklustre source material. No matter how good the stitching, a sow's ear remains a sow's ear, but it remains interesting watching the disparity between the rubbishy material and the aspiration to make it into something better than it is.

cybersleuth58 Some of this contains descriptions that could serve as spoilers... So be warned... Michael Pare, Danny Trejo, and Tom Sizemore are not exactly unknowns! So how could it be that bad??? Furnace is a movie which proves that even with talented actors a movie can be awful! There are so many elements that make this movie terrible. The lines are delivered poorly. There was no attempt to research the material; too much of it was completely ridiculous. For example, when an inmate is brought up from the furnace area speaking nonsense, the "doctor" orders "20 cc's of Haloperidol"! What???? Do you mean mgs?? Michael Pare's character makes some stupid comment to the "doctor" about having a posh practice in the suburbs to which she responds something equally as stupid about not "learning about the depths of the mind from sexually repressed housewives". The script is full gems like that! I could not figure out if the "Hot CSI girl" (aka coroner) was supposed to be the Medical Examiner or a crime scene tech...Unreality takes this movie to the point of being farcical. The prisoners all get to be one to a cell. (No overcrowding here)! There was also no racial tension... The Hispanics hang with the blacks and the whites. The doctor chalks up a lot to "narcotics" but apparently no one even thinks to pull urines on the prisoners or the guards. In fact, no one at the prison impresses the viewer as being particularly competent. I got so bored after about 30 minutes that I found myself checking my email. Because of the complete lack of character development there is no desire to see them resolve the conflicts presented by the... errr.... plot, and I use that term loosely.This was so far fetched that it felt like something a kid might have written. Don't waste your time with this one... Unless of course you've come out of surgery and have been given such good drugs that you don't care ...

Paul Andrews Furnace starts as Blackgate Prison guard Joey Robbins (Paul Wall) kills himself at home, his wife tells detective Michael Turner (Michael Paré) that there was no reason for her husband to commit suicide. Then later that night a prisoner named Jamison (Taylor Kinney) seemingly also commits suicide at Blackgate, detective Turner feels the two cases are linked somehow & when a third inmate is also found dead Turner is convinced something is going on. Turner befriends & enlists the help of Blackgate psychiatrist Dr. Ashley Carter (Jenny McShane) who is sure that illegal drugs are to blame but as Turner investigates the three apparent suicides the one connecting factor is a recently reopened cell block that has been bricked up for fifty years after the previous warden was murdered there, Turner discovers the dark past of the cell block has a very real present day effect as vengeful spirits seek revenge...Co-written, co-produced & directed by William Butler this feels like a fairly standard rip-off of The Ring (2002) as the vengeful spirit of a young girl is awakened & seeks some sort of revenge or some wrong that needs righting, as such I suppose it's OK but nothing memorable & there are better examples out there. The plot is fairly standard stuff but the prison setting is quite cool & one underused in the horror genre, the actual revelations at the end are forgettable & don't seem to have much thought put into them. There are also various plot ideas that go nowhere, Tom Sizemore's character in particular is just totally forgotten about, the prison riot is never resolved & there's no real reason given as to why the ghost makes people commit suicide rather than just kill them. The character's are alright & they are fleshed out a little (although it's never made clear why Turner & Miller dislike each other so much), at 80 odd minutes in length it's not too long & while it's not the most incident packed film ever there's just about enough going on to sustain ones attention.Text at the beginning of Furnace claims it was 'Inspired by Actual Eevnts' which I found hard to believe. There seems to be comic book references aplenty here, the two main characters called Frank Miller & Michael Turner are both real life comic book artist's & Blackgate Prison is the name of the prison used in the DC comic books including Batman. Although quite well made it's not that scary & the ghost scenes are a bit dull, the usual slightly pale looking girl who moves in strange ways as well as a burned man who are typical ghost fair. There's very little gore, there's a bit of blood, a couple of severed fingers & nothing else.The IMDb reckons Furnace had a budget of about $3,000,000 which sounds like a lot of money to me, the production values are good but bland. Filmed in the old Tennesse State Prison apparently which explains why there's only about ten inmates. The acting is alright, rapper Ja Rule has a cameo while Tom Sizemore probably filmed his footage in a couple of days.Furnace is an OK time waster, it's the sort of Asian ghost story that has been done to death & the sort of story you can't do much with & Furnace doesn't even try. I've seen worse but I've seen better too.

gavin6942 Inmates at the local prison are dying horribly. The local police detective is drawn in to the case after one of the security guards dies (shoots himself) upon going home. Can he, with the help of the prison psychologist, find out what is causing these nasty deaths? And what is in the furnace? I was a bit excited to receive this film. Tom Sizemore? Disposable but fun. Danny Trejo? I'll take him (even though his role here is small and forgettable). I was even more interested because of the involvement of director William Butler, whom I had previously interviewed. To put it lightly, we didn't get along as well as I would have liked. And I really wanted to like his film... but it's not good. I can sum it up in one word: bland. It's the visual equivalent of munching on cardboard. It's slow, the characters are uninteresting and Michael Pare is such a boring lead that I couldn't care about him (and cared even less when he gave his clichéd speech about his lost family).The film also suffers from a serious woman problem. Let's be frank: when you set a film up with some gorgeous women, throw in a sex scene and label the movie "unrated", people expect to see some skin. Don't get your hopes up. The sex scene has a strategically-placed candle, so you get nothing. And then, one is left to wonder if the main character is blind: he keeps blowing off the smoking hot redhead CSI woman who is interested in him and instead pursues the mediocre psychologist. I speak for every red-blooded male: more screen time for hot women, less screen time for average women. Thank you.There's a "bad twist" later on. Actually, I don't know if it's a twist or not, but we're given information we should already have known. So, it's either a bad twist or they are insulting our memories and intelligence. As well as our patience, since I suspect many people didn't make it to the end.The best part of this movie was the special effect used to show the "ghosts". Now, I don't really understand what the deal is with the ghosts... they seem to be unlimited in their travel ability rather than attached to the prison. But nevermind that. The visuals were really cool. They could have been the same old CGI that every other movie uses and frustrates me, but it was something new: a black and white "television static" effect. It was legitimately creepy. So, effects department, my hat's off to you.This film is avoidable. It's slow, not well-acted (aside from Ja Rule, surprisingly) and adds nothing new to the history of horror. Perhaps with a second viewing I could appreciate it better, but it seems that they took a weak story and stretched it out into a weaker film. You're better off renting just about anything else.