A young woman goes on the run following a violent incident. Changing her hair colour and calling herself Katie, she arrives at a small seaside town where she soon makes friends, including a handsome young man, conveniently widowed with two young children. However, a police officer is on her trail...
What we have here is a romance, cross-pollinated with a mystery about Katie's backstory and a suspense thriller about the police officer who is after her, coupled with a couple of other cross-genre oddments (the young son who can't let go of his mother, will he bond with Katie or reject her, and so on). I am lucky: I have not read the book on which this film is based, nor have I seen Sleeping With The Enemy (on account of my cordial dislike of the vastly overrated Julia Roberts) so, for me, this movie was not totally devoid of surprises. Having said that, I didn't find too much here to make my jaw drop.
The main strength of the film is Julianne Hough as Katie. This is the third film I have seen her in, and she is both easy on the eye and able to project an innate likability. The part of Katie stretches her a little more than Footloose and Rock Of Ages did, and she does well enough. Josh Duhamel as sensitive and hunky widower Alex is sensitive and hunky, David Lyons as nemesis Tierney is satisfactorily over the top in a caricature part, and Mimi Kirkland as moppet Lexie walks away on diminutive legs with every scene she is in.
This is mostly a nice film - overflowing with niceness in fact which, in some quarters, might be regarded as a criticism - leavened with a touch of nastiness. I liked it, but was under no illusions that it was anything other than a potboiler (with a rather daft and unnecessary twist at the end).
What we have here is a romance, cross-pollinated with a mystery about Katie's backstory and a suspense thriller about the police officer who is after her, coupled with a couple of other cross-genre oddments (the young son who can't let go of his mother, will he bond with Katie or reject her, and so on). I am lucky: I have not read the book on which this film is based, nor have I seen Sleeping With The Enemy (on account of my cordial dislike of the vastly overrated Julia Roberts) so, for me, this movie was not totally devoid of surprises. Having said that, I didn't find too much here to make my jaw drop.
The main strength of the film is Julianne Hough as Katie. This is the third film I have seen her in, and she is both easy on the eye and able to project an innate likability. The part of Katie stretches her a little more than Footloose and Rock Of Ages did, and she does well enough. Josh Duhamel as sensitive and hunky widower Alex is sensitive and hunky, David Lyons as nemesis Tierney is satisfactorily over the top in a caricature part, and Mimi Kirkland as moppet Lexie walks away on diminutive legs with every scene she is in.
This is mostly a nice film - overflowing with niceness in fact which, in some quarters, might be regarded as a criticism - leavened with a touch of nastiness. I liked it, but was under no illusions that it was anything other than a potboiler (with a rather daft and unnecessary twist at the end).