This movie was a well-crafted thriller in the Hitchcock style; I really wish I had not seen any of the trailers prior to viewing this movie, because some of the suspense that would normally have built up during the first hour was spoiled by knowledge gained from the trailer. To be fair, the trailer doesn't spoil everything (thank goodness), but it spoils enough to make the first hour seem a little slow in the build-up.
Michelle Pfeiffer is terrific in her role of the housewife and mother now facing an empty nest, as her daughter heads off to college. Robert Zemeckis does a fine job of building suspense and keeping the audience just a little off-balance (in spite of the spoilers in the trailers); in combination with Pfeiffer's acting, one is never quite sure whether Claire Spencer is deranged, possessed, or calculating. While Harrison Ford does his usual fine job of acting, as the obsessive, genius husband living in the shadow of his super-genius father, it is Pfeiffer who, of the two, has the most screen time and who therefore carries the film.
My only other complaint (besides the spoilers in the trailers) has to do with a minor bit of casting. While I think Wendy Crewson is a fine actress, I have to question casting her as the wife of one of Dr. Spencer's colleagues, given that she so recently appeared as Harrison Ford's wife in Air Force One... seeing Ford and Crewson together on screen again was a distraction that brought me out of the film, at a point when I should have been getting more absorbed into the film. But it is a minor point.
Overall, the movie kept me in suspense virtually throughout it's entirety, and the final 30 minutes were gripping. At several points toward the end, I thought for sure I knew what was going to happen, only to be surprised by a sudden twist or unexpected turn. And, the film does have its humorous moments as well; Diane Scarwid helps to lighten things up as Claire's somewhat ditzy friend Jody, and Zemeckis has some fun with some of the backdrops in the quaint New England towns (a Vermont town named Adamant? And the name of the curio shop is "The Sleeping Dog", as in "Let sleeping dogs lie.")
Rating: 8 out of 10
Michelle Pfeiffer is terrific in her role of the housewife and mother now facing an empty nest, as her daughter heads off to college. Robert Zemeckis does a fine job of building suspense and keeping the audience just a little off-balance (in spite of the spoilers in the trailers); in combination with Pfeiffer's acting, one is never quite sure whether Claire Spencer is deranged, possessed, or calculating. While Harrison Ford does his usual fine job of acting, as the obsessive, genius husband living in the shadow of his super-genius father, it is Pfeiffer who, of the two, has the most screen time and who therefore carries the film.
My only other complaint (besides the spoilers in the trailers) has to do with a minor bit of casting. While I think Wendy Crewson is a fine actress, I have to question casting her as the wife of one of Dr. Spencer's colleagues, given that she so recently appeared as Harrison Ford's wife in Air Force One... seeing Ford and Crewson together on screen again was a distraction that brought me out of the film, at a point when I should have been getting more absorbed into the film. But it is a minor point.
Overall, the movie kept me in suspense virtually throughout it's entirety, and the final 30 minutes were gripping. At several points toward the end, I thought for sure I knew what was going to happen, only to be surprised by a sudden twist or unexpected turn. And, the film does have its humorous moments as well; Diane Scarwid helps to lighten things up as Claire's somewhat ditzy friend Jody, and Zemeckis has some fun with some of the backdrops in the quaint New England towns (a Vermont town named Adamant? And the name of the curio shop is "The Sleeping Dog", as in "Let sleeping dogs lie.")
Rating: 8 out of 10