What Lies Beneath

I have noticed that many great directors who are no known for suspense movies try their hand at the genre.  Martin Scorsese has made Cape Fear and Shutter Island.  Spielberg has made Duel.  Sidney Lumet made Guilty as Sin and Before the Devil Knows Your Dead.  Sydney Pollack made Three Days of the Condor, Rob Reiner made Misery, Orson Welles made The Lady in Shanghai, which had a climax that was spoofed by Woody Allen in his comical take on the genre in Manhattan Murder Mystery.  More recently Christopher Nolan made Insomnia, Denis Villeneuve made Prisoners and Quentin Tarantino made Death Proof.  In most of these cases these films are less ambitious than their directors’ greatest works but are more fun and thus audience pleasing.  I watched Killers of the Flower Moon in a half empty theatre in 2023 and I could not take my eyes off the screen for a moment and held off going to the bathroom during a 3 1/2 hour movie because I did not want to miss anything.  I would rate that as one of the best Scorsese films.  In 1991 I watched Cape Fear in a full cinema and had a great time with an audience completely into the film but in the end I would rate as mid to lower tier Scorsese. 

Robert Zemeckis, a filmmaker who continually challenges himself and his team took a stab at the genre with the 2000 film What Lies Beneath.  I think this film, while successful upon release in July 2000, (I watched it in a packed theatre the night after it opened) has been a little forgotten.  Zemeckis had planned the film for awhile but it was made during the period between filming the first and second halves of Cast Away to allow Tom Hanks time to lose around 40 pounds and grow a long beard (in Cast Away four years pass between these two sections of the film).  As Cast Away was a more ambitious film of the two and came out in the awards season it was the Zemeckis film everyone remembered (it also made much more money).  However I think it is worth giving What Lies Beneath a second look.

Spoilers below:

What Lies Beneath stars Michelle Pfeiffer and Harrison Ford as a couple who lives in a small town on Lake Champlain in Vermont during the summer and early fall of 1999.  Pfeiffer plays Claire, a former cellist with a daughter who a few years after being widowed married Ford’s science professor, Norman.  Norman works in the same field as his late father and though he is successful, he is nowhere near as accomplished as his father.  In addition Norman and Claire live in the same house Norman grew up in, so he is constantly reminded that he lives in his father’s shadow which preys on his insecurities.

Claire’s daughter leaves for college at the start of the story which leaves Claire with a lot of free time, but also severs her only remaining connection to her old life.  Claire learns that her married neighbors, the Feurs, have a volatile relationship and eventually comes to suspect the husband may have murdered his wife, as there is evidence that her own house is haunted. Claire feels she may be visited by the wife’s ghosts though this is comically disproved.  It turns out that the ghost is Madison (played by Amber Valletta, who looks more than a little like Pfeiffer), a student Norman had an affair with a year before.  Claire spends the second half of the film determining what happened to Madison and if Norman was involved, at ever increasing risk to herself.

Zemeckis has a lot of fun playing with suspense tropes while paying homage to Hitchcock, particularly Rear Window during the scenes where she suspects her neighbors.  There are several scenes where Claire spies with binoculars and we only see the neighbors from her distant point of view, although unlike in Rear Window Claire interacts with them repeatedly.  The casting of James Remar as the husband, props up our suspicions further since he has played a lot of villains.  Zemeckis gives us a big jump scare when showing Claire’s point of view through the binoculars she spots Mr. Feur looking right back at her, reminiscent of a similar shot of Raymond Burr in Rear Window.  Right after that Clair instinctively backs into Norman where she should be safe, but he is the actual threat.

I think some critics did not like that the neighbors subplot turns out to be a red herring as Mrs. Fear turns up alive but the whole sequence sets the stage and leads to Claire trusting her own instincts when she realizes Madison is the one haunting the house, which in turn leads to the revelation that Norman had an affair with her.  The way this plays out is a little similar to the first half of Hitchcock’s Vertigo where Madeleine may be inhabited by the long dead Carlotta.  

Harrison Ford’s casting is the big twist here.  If another middle aged A list actor of the time such as Kevin Spacey, Robert De Niro, or Michael Douglas had played Norman in the audience we might have suspected him to be dangerous far sooner.  Ford had played an antagonistic character only once, in The Conversation, but it was a small role early in his career and while The Conversation is well remembered among film fans it was not a big hit.  Ford also played an unlikeable character in The Mosquito Coast but that was a low budget drama.  By and large Ford had played heroic roles like Han Solo, Indiana Jones, The Fugitive, Jack Ryan and the President in Air Force One.  The films featuring these characters have been seen again and again by audiences.  Some of Ford’s other characters, particularly Jones, are grumpy but they are ultimately noble.  Even the weak willed prosecutor Rusty Sabich in Presumed Innocent is flawed but still stands on the right side of justice.  

When Norman acts a little cold toward Claire we are used to seeing that from Ford, though we expect him to do the right thing when she is danger.  Zemeckis and Ford have a good teaser when Claire, possessed, jumps into the cold lake.  Norman dives and in pulls her out apparently to save her life but really to keep her from accessing the chest at the bottom of the lake (which is more shallow near the dock) Ford modulates his performance throughout the film, becoming a little more desperate as the his lies are gradually exposed.  Sadly the trailer gave away the affair which was a mistake.  In the course of the film we learn this about halfway through during an extended scene where Claire is possessed by Madison.  Pfeiffer has a lot of fun in the scene wearing a red dress, to appear as a temptress, and acting far more sexually aggressive than we saw Claire in their earlier bedroom scene together.  Ford as Norman appears so confused by it I wonder if Madison had been the same way with him.  Notably it is the only scene told from Norman’s point of view.  A hint of Norman’s true nature appears when he pushes Claire off him onto the floor.  Claire is not hurt by it but in any other situation this would be domestic abuse.  However since Claire gets right up and forces Norman to face up to the affair the focus of the scene changes.  But this is a big scene halfway through the film and I think the trailer could have addressed the ghost and the suspicion of the neighbors without revealing the affair.

Composer Alan Silvestri, who has worked with Zemeckis since 1984’s Romancing The Stone, provides a score that in the quieter moments sounds a little like the main theme of Jerry Goldsmith’s Basic Instinct.  During the track The Getaway Zemeckis is clearly influenced by Bernard Hermann’s score for the main theme for Psycho though Zemeckis uses more brass whereas Hermann’s score uses violins and is a little faster.

I noticed in The Back to the Future films Zemeckis enjoys setting up a lot of obstacles for Marty and Doc to accomplish their goals.  Similarly in Cast Away Chuck is trapped on his island by the rising tide that he is only able to surpass when a piece of a porta potty lands on his island that he is able to use for a makeshift sail.  Here Zemeckis surpasses himself when Norman drugs Claire with halothane so that she is awake but temporarily paralyzed as Norman puts her in a bathtub filled with slowly filling water and Claire cannot move or even hope to overcome Norman who is right there.  Zemeckis and Silvestri use little score, allowing the sound design of the water coming out of the faucet to create the horror.  Pfeiffer can only use her eyes to act since Claire cannot move her head.  Pfeiffer looks terrified but also we can see the wheels turning in her head when the opportunity arises.  I remember being in the cinema and trying to figure out how in the world she was going to get out of this.  When Norman sees the necklace I knew somehow Madison would help Claire as Madison briefly inhabits Claire which spooks Norman and gives him a concussion and knocks the shower head into the bathtub.  The halothane is established earlier as wearing off after a few minutes so we are prepped for Claire to be able to move her extremities just enough to stop drowning in time.  However Zemeckis gives her one last obstacle when she breaks the chain of the drain tub stopper and has to in the nick of time turn down the flow of the water and knock the stopper free.  Each of these actions is very deliberate and dragged out for maximum suspense, with limited perspective as Zemeckis and his cinematographer Don Burgess keep the camera mostly in and around the bathtub .  There is enough focus on Claire’s feet that if not for the pristine production I might have believed I was watching a Tarantino movie.  The closing moments of the sequence in which it is revealed Norman must have crawled out of the bathroom after briefly waking up before collapsing at the bottom of the stairs, is a good button to the scene.

The finale, in which Claire is driving a truck with a boat attached with Norman in the bed of the truck trying to get to her is scary but generic and nowhere near as effective as the bathtub scene.  Norman was so badly hurt that he should be far more weakened.  When the pole disturbs Madison’s corpse the ghost saves her from Norman in a fitting conclusion.  We had thought the ghost was trying to get to Claire and Norman but the ghost was actually trying to warn Claire about Norman.  

There are a couple of other questionable elements to the film.  Zemeckis overplays the rhythm of the jump scares.  They usually come at the end of a long, somewhat circular camera move a time when the camera moves around a character and then stops (ie when Claire is looking at the phone and just as she sees that Norman dialed 411 instead of 911 he is right behind with the halothane) and thus become a little predictable even though the score usually does not telegraph it.  Also although we see that Claire uses the braid to let Madison possess her we never learn why.  Lastly Madison’s ghost appears randomly but seemingly at the needs of the plot.  When I first saw the film and they went into the water at the end I knew Madison’s ghost would probably save the day.

What Lies Beneath is a fun, and aptly named thriller with strong performances and an excellent meta casting twist.  Zemeckis films are always worth a good look and this one is no exception.  ****