Continuing with Ms. Spenser's early Halloween Spooktacular, we watched What Lies Beneath (2000). Directed by Robert Zemekis, script by Glark Greg (!) and starring Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer, it looked like it couldn't miss. But for some reason, Amazon Prime wanted to know if we wanted to watch it again - but we were sure we'd never seen it before.
It starts with Pfeiffer and Harrison sending their daughter off to Princeton. That leaves them in their beautiful lakeside home in Vermont. Harrison is a researcher at a local college, and Pfeiffer looks after the house and lovely gardens. There is a brief scene, showing pictures and news articles hinting at problems in the past - death of a father, car crash, but we were talking over it, trying to remember if we'd seen this before.
Pfeiffer is all alone in her empty nest, and begins getting a little jumpy. Small things, like doors that don't stay closed, start to unnerve her. The new neighbors are a little creepy - loud sex at night, pitiful crying during the day. It looks like a Rear Window situation, but that turns out to be a red herring. The real problem is closer to home.
This movie has a lot going for it. Zemekis knows how to bring the suspense, and isn't above a little flashy camera work. The script has a nice slow burn and then a wild last act. Pfeiffer does some great acting, and Harrison... well, let's say he fades into the background when he needs to. So I'm not sure why we didn't remember seeing this before. I'm sure we did; I remembered tiny bits here and there. Ms. S didn't remember a thing, so maybe I saw it by myself?
Anyway, the whole thing didn't really do it for us. Maybe we're immune to the sexiness of Pfeiffer and Harrison in a hot marriage. Maybe the Rear Window fake-out turned us off. Oh well, since I've now blogged it, I'm pretty sure we won't get forget and watch it again.
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