At the very start of the noughties, the horror genre was churning out some decent, if unspectacular movies. We saw the re-emergence of the spoof with the first entry in the Scary Movie franchise, Pinhead and co. continued to wreak spiky havoc in Hellraiser: Inferno, while the werewolf genre would get revived with the fun and well received Ginger Snaps. We also got a pretty poor Blair Witch sequel, and let’s face it, the first movie in that series only got traction due to an ingenious marketing campaign, and the media spouting bollocks about people being sick in the cinema from shock. Not the incredibly shaky camera work. Requiem for a Dream provided some messed up thrills, as did the similarly perverted Hollow Man. However, for every decent horror movie that was released, we also got howlers like Da Hip Hop Witch with Eminem. My point is, what the genre needed at the time was a visionary director to jolt some life back into it, and the man who helmed the movie we’re talking about today had some pretty good form for revolutionary filmmaking; Robert Zemeckis. Throughout his career the Chicagoan filmmaker has often tried to push the boundaries of storytelling through state of the art visual effects. His Back to the Future trilogy is testament to this, as are movies such as Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Death Becomes Her and Forrest Gump. Some of his other efforts, such as Beowuf and The Polar Express also featured VFX that attempted to push the boundaries of digital effects, but suffered from an unwanted journey to the uncanny valley. However, up until the year 2000, Zemeckis hadn’t tackled the horror genre to any large degree, not counting the writing he did for Bordello of Blood of course. However, when his good pal Steven Spielberg introduced the script for What Lies Beneath to him, Zemeckis saw the opportunity to properly dip his toes in the horror world. But, could the legendary director bring some of his visionary filmmaking and visual wizardry to the project? Stay tuned to find out gore-hounds, here on WTF happened to What Lies Beneath.
By the year 2000, the careers of stars Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer were not only firmly established in Hollywood, naturally, but still on the ascendency. Ford had hung up his fedora for what he thought was the last time, and for what probably should have been the last time to be fair. He’d also taken on another iconic character in Jack Ryan, been a Fugitive, played POTUS in Air Force One and also taken on an ill-advised starring role opposite Anne Heche in the terrible Six Days, Seven Nights. He was kind of a big deal still so when the opportunity to work with Bob Zemeckis on a horror / thriller project landed on his desk, opposite the wonderful Michelle Pfeiffer, he mustn’t have had to think too long and hard about signing up.
The same can probably be said about Pfeiffer. Up until the release of What Lies Beneath she hadn’t racked up as many iconic roles as Ford had, arguably, but her status as one of Hollywood’s most talented, and beautiful, leading ladies was never in doubt. She excelled in movies like Married to the Mob, Dangerous Liaisons and the fabulous, Fabulous Baker Boys and her legendary role in 1992’s Batman Returns still remains the greatest portrayal of Catwoman, ever. Sorry Julie, Ertha, Anne, Zoe and definitely Halle…She had also wolfed out with Jack Nicholson, played an inspirational teacher, and tackled the bard, before Zemeckis asked her to get very wet in the name of her art, in What Lies Beneath.
The movie’s story was partly written by documentary filmmaker Sarah Kernochan, with re-writes by Clark Gregg, and she had adapted a personal experience with the paranormal as a script treatment featuring a retirement aged couple, who are dealing with restless but compassionate spirits. Zemeckis had already signed a deal with Dreamworks to distribute the films of newly founded production company, ImageMovers, and was keen on doing a thriller, so when Speilberg came to him with the What Lies Beneath script he had the perfect opportunity to test his skill in the genre. Ford and Pfeiffer were Zemeckis’ first choice for the lead roles in the movie, and Ford was so keen, he agreed to clear his busy schedule to make room for the project. Joining the two stars as part of the larger ensemble were Diana Scarwid as Jody, Miranda Otto as Mary, James Remar as Warren, Amber Valetta as Madison, Katharine Towne as Caitlen, plus the fella responsible for evil robots taking over the world, Joe Morton. Thanks Joe! An interesting snippet to note is that Zemeckis filmed What Lies Beneath while Cast Away was shut down to allow Tom Hanks to lose weight, grow a beard and practice talking to volleyballs.
I remember first catching What Lies Beneath on home entertainment, not long after it was first released, and from what I recall I enjoyed the movie, but felt that considering the talent involved both behind and in front of the camera, it was slightly underwhelming. I was pretty young to be fair though, so could re-watching it with more mature eyes for this retrospective change my perspective on the movie? Well, as I’ll get into shortly, the answer is no, not exactly. The plot of the movie sees Ford and Pfeiffer’s married couple, Norman and Claire Spencer’s seemingly idyllic life slowly fall apart when Claire starts to believe there may be a ghost in their new house. As the supernatural shenanigans begin to intensify, it soon becomes apparent that not only is the spirit real, but it is hell bent on revealing a horrible truth for the couple.
I think my main gripe with the movie is that it could have been a lot scarier, and despite being a fun thrill ride for the first hour or so, plus a tension inducing final act, it’s middle section is too flabby and uninteresting to elevate it beyond being simply a fun if forgettable exercise in building spooky thrills. There’s nothing of any real note that Zemeckis brings from his vast wheelhouse of visual trickery to the movie. He crafts the tension with a nice nod to Hitchcock; almost like a paint-by-numbers lesson on genre filmmaking, but it would have been good to see him leave his own indelible mark on the film. He does build the tension nicely for the most part with neighbors’ wives going missing, strange keys, supernatural clues, the hint of a troubled past for the protagonists, and some moments of shock that are a touch too ‘generic’ for this gore-hound to appreciate.
However, the final stretch is a fun, artfully crafted denouement for the movie that manages to pack some iconic imagery into it; the most obvious being the paralysis inducing drug that results in a chilling bathtub scene, that’s literally dripping with tension. The plot comes to a head with the help of a decomposing corpse, and a necklace that’s been long buried. However, the movie’s trying to be everything all at once while not really mastering any aspects of it. Its typical genre tropes don’t befit the genre with enough invention, and it doesn’t really know if it wants to be a ghost story, a murderous thriller or a grown up horror. Plus, Zemeckis and his skills are kinda wasted as director. It’s enjoyable but nothing more, unfortunately.
What Lies Beneath was released on July 21st, 2000, and grossed almost $30 million from a total of 2,813 domestic theaters. It opened as the number one film over its first weekend, replacing X-Men at the top spot. The film ended up earning $155 million domestically and $136 million internationally, for a total of $291.5 million worldwide, close to triple its production budget of $100 million.
The film received fairly average reviews and on Rotten Tomatoes, it holds an approval rating of 47% based on 126 reviews, with an average rating of 5.50/10. The site’s critics consensus reads: “Robert Zemeckis is unable to salvage an uncompelling and unoriginal film.” The more traditional critics lamented what was considered to be a slightly wasted opportunity. The New York Times said that, “at the start, Zemeckis zaps us with quick, glib scares, just to show he still knows how, but his heart isn’t in this kind of material anymore. His reflexes are a little slow.” The Los Angeles Times called it “spooky with a polished kind of creepiness added in. What Lies Beneath nevertheless feels more planned than passionate, scary at points but unconvincing overall.”
But, what do those critics know? The most important opinion we always love to hear is from YOU guys, so what’s your take on the Bob Zemeckis horror / thriller? Do you agree that it misses the mark more than it hits some horror home runs, or is it an effective genre film with some great performances that’s bogged down by an uninteresting middle act? Robert Zemeckis has recently unveiled the trailer for his new movie, Here, that looks like it’s a shift back to the more visionary and VFX driven nature of his movies. So, could What Lies Beneath have done with more of his inventiveness or is just fine as it is, thank you very much? Let me know in the comments and I’ll see you wonderful gore-hounds next time. Thanks for watching!
A couple of the previous episodes of WTF Happened to This Horror Movie? can be seen below. To see more, head over to our JoBlo Horror Originals YouTube channel – and subscribe while you’re there!