What a wasted effort. A story with real possibilities, and probably the perfect actor to portray the psychopathic lead in Mickey Rourke. He was probably the only thing that was able to keep this thing from completely sinking.
Anthony Hopkins was simply the wrong choice for the role of the husband here. It's really hard to understand this; he simply didn't belong in the role. He may be one of the finest actors in the world, but that doesn't mean he is the right choice for any character. He was simply out of place. This was probably the biggest distraction, in a movie pretty much full of them. I can't even begin on Lindsay Crouse's FBI agent character. This has to be one of the most bizarre acting jobs in memory, and her accent is from a solar system we haven't visited yet. Shawnee Smith's leering, sneering teenager was laughably naive and idiotic.
Was ANYBODY directing this?
Some of the dialogue was bad, some of the acting was bad, and the pacing, atmospherics and camera cuts were choppy and jarring, and poorly thought out.
There was, obviously, a real opportunity to make a very good suburban horror story, and this was completely scuttled by lazy, slap-dash film-making.
Anthony Hopkins was simply the wrong choice for the role of the husband here. It's really hard to understand this; he simply didn't belong in the role. He may be one of the finest actors in the world, but that doesn't mean he is the right choice for any character. He was simply out of place. This was probably the biggest distraction, in a movie pretty much full of them. I can't even begin on Lindsay Crouse's FBI agent character. This has to be one of the most bizarre acting jobs in memory, and her accent is from a solar system we haven't visited yet. Shawnee Smith's leering, sneering teenager was laughably naive and idiotic.
Was ANYBODY directing this?
Some of the dialogue was bad, some of the acting was bad, and the pacing, atmospherics and camera cuts were choppy and jarring, and poorly thought out.
There was, obviously, a real opportunity to make a very good suburban horror story, and this was completely scuttled by lazy, slap-dash film-making.