Furnace (film)

Furnace is a 2007 horror film written and directed by William Butler. It stars Danny Trejo, Michael Paré, Tom Sizemore, Ja Rule, and Paul Wall.

Plot
A group of prisoners are assigned to assist in the re-opening of an old prison's closed wing. They find that the furnace room in the wing is the location of a murder, and the victim's spirit seeks death of those who enter the room.

Cast

 * Michael Paré as Detective Michael Turner
 * Ja Rule as Terrence Dufresne
 * Jenny McShane as Dr. Ashley Carter
 * Danny Trejo as Fury
 * Tom Sizemore as Frank Miller
 * Kelly Stables as Karen Bolding
 * Paul Wall as Joey Robbins
 * Mike Jones (rapper) as Detective James Fury

Production
The original script for Furnace was written by Anghus Houvouras, and the project was brought up to director William Butler, who thought that the story was reminiscent of the 1988 film Prison. Butler signed to direct, and he and his writing partner Aaron Strongoni collaborated to polish the script to meet Melee Entertainment's budgetary concerns. The rewriting lasted six months and changed the story substantially. Butler said of the change, "This of course was no reflection on Anghus, but instead the team of people at Melee that sort of took the film in another direction."

Release
The film was released on DVD by Melee Studio on February 12, 2008.

Reception
Critical reception for the film has been mostly negative.

Dread Central awarded the film a score of 2.5 / 5 stating "All in all, Furnace is just another blah horror entry to clutter the direct-to-DVD market. As if the floating head cover weren't enough on its own to dissuade you from picking it up believe me, this furnace is just blowing smoke". David Johnson from DVD Verdict gave the film a negative review criticizing the film's first half as being too slow and stated that the film would likely disappoint horror fans.