Hey folks, Harry here. You should know that this review is scathing, but you should be aware that it is a mere saline solution when compared to the venom and acidic hatred that the dear Professor Moriarty has for WHAT LIES BENEATH. However... Not everyone shares this hatred, I talked to Jeffrey Wells over at Reel.Com the other day and he liked it, didn't say it was perfect, but it was his fave Zemeckis film since USED CARS... That being said... the script was pretty weak throughout the development of this film. The word has been alternately miserable and... passable. I wish it was otherwords. I am one of Zemeckis' biggest supporters, and God Knows I would love to see Harrison Ford get out of this slump he's in. Here's the review...
Welcome back, Harry.
I. C. Moovies is in the house.
All the time lurker here, who's deciding to share my thoughts with you on a film I saw Friday that starred my favorite film hero of my childhood. And it ain't pretty. Or cool. And neither are my feelings right now.
My review of What Lies Beneath. Non-Spoilers. Screened at the Academy Theater, in California, on 7/14/00.
Time for Harrison Ford to retire? Poor Harrison. What a lousy year this has been for him. First he whimpers away from Soderbergh's Traffic because it would have been too difficult for him. He then passes on Gemini which would have given us two Ford's for the price of one, with Matrix style special-effects and killer action sequences and an exciting new character for him to develop. Then he walks away from one of his safest (read: money in the box office bank) film roles = Jack Ryan. What's he going to do when his romantic films keep bombing? Time for the man to make a change. Either fire his agent Patricia McQueeney he's had for ages, and who's not helping his career anymore, or start making some damn better film role choices. Yeah, yeah, I know, he's the biggest box office draw in the entire history of motion pictures, and will be for a very very long time because of his total grosses. But if he keeps making films like Random Hearts, 6 Days, 7 Nights, The Devil's Own, Sabrina, and now What Lies Beneath in the future, the studios are gonna start paying him to stop making movies. Period!
And now to the mess at hand:
What Lies Beneath is an example movie. An example as what not to do with a film, as my film professor would explain. By now many of who that are reading this know of the plot behind this hideously awful movie. 'He was the perfect husband until his one mistake followed them home.' That's what the mini-movie called this film's trailer told us at every screening of every film playing this summer at every multiplex.
Harrison Ford (as Professor Norman Spencer) and Michelle Pfeiffer (as Claire Spencer) star as a married couple troubled by one of Harrison's flings from his past. Only thing is, get ready for this, the former fling is "supposedly" a ghost returning to haunt Harrison's character and/or Michelle's. Yada yada yada. But, what you see in the trailer isn't totally what you see in the film. There are some, uh, twists. Big surprise there. The twists are some of the most unintentional funny ones I have seen since the wonderful 1998 dark comedy Wild Things. Only thing though, that Bill Murray film was meant to elicit an audible laughing response from the audience. With this pitiful film, you laugh at this stinker because of its stupidity in filmmaking and acting and writing, and mostly because you feel embarrassed for everyone involved in the creation of this mess.
The film has its moments though. Mostly thanks to Robert Zemeckis' straight on direction, and his cinematographer's camera work. Zemeckis can even make the worst set up scenes seem passable. And Michelle Pfeiffer carries the film with her beautiful looks, and her talent as a reliable actor who knows how to emote, even in the most awkward of film moments. Harrison Ford could learn some of these traits from Pfeiffer. Michelle is hands-down a more believable emoter and screen presence than old Ford has been in the last few years.
Where this film is lacking is in two crucial departments. One: acting. Harrison Ford has got to decide how he wants to spend the remaining years of his dying film career. Is he going to make every film of his a romantic flick? Whether it be in the form of a thriller, drama, or comedy? When Harrison was on top of the world is when he was doing what he always did best. Thrilling & pleasing audiences with his killer looks, lopsided grin, and playing the daredevil space pirate, detective, archeologist, replicant hunter, fugitive, CIA agent, the president and the like. He was always creating new on-screen personas. What Lies Beneath is one of his many new god awful bland performances in his sagging career of late. The man has no expression anymore. The wood pile in my backyard has more charisma than Harrison Ford has had in the last 6 years.
Problem 2: The script. Whomever at Dreamworks (the studio behind this gem) greenlit this turkey based on what they read in Clark Gregg's screenplay needs to be shipped off to an island far, far away. Better yet, sent off to live among the cast of Survivor and forced to eat rats for the remainder of his/her life. This film contains some of the most absurd dialogue to be spurted out on screen since 1995s Showgirls. One scene on a bridge in particular, includes a cell phone. And the dialogue that comes out of one character's mouth wins this year's funniest line, on par with last year's "kill, kill" from the talking-to-the-dog scene in Summer Of Sam.
After Battlefield Earth in May, I thought John Travolta's film would be the sole worst film of the year. Heck, the new millennium. What Lies Beneath may very well steal that title from Travolta's science fiction yarn.
1/2 star out of 4.
I. C. Moovies - who really really really misses the Harrison Ford that seems to have disappeared sometime after his last Jack Ryan film in 1994 (and slightly resurfaced in the 1997 hit Air Force One). Can anyone tell me where he went?
