Monday, October 10, 2011

More of a nightmare


I used to be a big sucker for movies like Dream House.  A thriller with an interesting premise...even if the trailer gives away half the damn movie, it still looked like it had promise.  Okay, maybe I still am a sucker for these types of movies...or trailers if you will.


Did I like Dream House?  I liked bits of it.  The intro is standard: the happy family who are renovating the new house they just moved in to.  Then weird stuff happens.  We come to find out their were murders involving the previous owners the house, the father went nuts and murdered his wife and two daughters.  People won't look James Bond, I mean Daniel Craig in the eye.  They look skittish around him.  No...could it be?


Well yes, the second part of the film implies that Craig did indeed off the wifey and the two little ones.  For me, this was the most interesting part of the movie.  Craig comes to the realization that he may have been responsible for their murders and the ghosts (or is it hallucinations of Craig's sick mind?) refuse to believe that he killed them.  No matter how much he tries to convince them...or is it himself he's trying to convince?


Anyhow, the last third of the movie is just, it's ludicrous.  This is where Dream House fails.  Suffice to say, they had the real opportunity to do something different with this film, make it unique and something you don't see every day.  However, they went totally mainstream for the last part of the movie and it's really, really awful.  I'm talking contrived, tacked-on-so-we-can-have-a-happy-ending nonsense.  It makes no sense not just in the context of the movie, but in the framework of an everyday world.  This is really the sort of movie that needs, no DEMANDS more of a downer or dry ending.  Instead, it oddly turns out all roses and tulips. 


Unfortunately too, the way the film was put-together, you'll be able to know the final twist a mile away.  I'm not talking about "I think this happened", I'm talking about "this happened and this and this are the people involved."  It was almost like they got a neat script and they were like "okay, how can we make this completely amateurish?"


It's a shame really, because the promise for the film is there.  It's just not executed very well.  All the actors try hard but in actuality, they were there for a paycheck, you get the sense that all of them pretty much knew how this film was going to turn out.  I guess the best thing to come of this from Craig is he married Rachel Weisz in real life.  I guess that's a nice consolation prize for having this cheese on his filmography.


Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars.


- Stephenstein

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