What Lies Beneath (2000)

July 21, 2000 (US) • Drama, Horror, Mystery, Thriller • 130m

Overview

Norman and Claire Spencer are a seemingly happily married couple who uncover a terrible secret… a secret so disturbing it threatens to destroy them.

Director

Clark Gregg, Sarah Kernochan, Clark Gregg

Top Billed

Michelle Pfeiffer

Keywords

lake therapist haunted house haunting suspicion ouija board car accident new neighbor vermont missing child ghost séance mysterious shocking angry secret absurd admiring ambiguous appreciative approving audacious baffled sympathetic vibrant

Where to watch

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Top Billed Cast

Crew

Reviews

John Chard

⭐ 7/10

July 10, 2015

You're not yourself today are you?

Claire and Norman Spencer's marriage starts to fall apart when she believes there is a ghost in the house. Things gather apace when Claire is convinced that the spirit is trying to tell her something. Something that could be too close to home for comfort.

Robert Zemeckis does Hitchcock? Well yes, the influence is obvious, unashamedly so. But the trouble with that, is having the maestro as a benchmark renders all other modern day attempts as folly. However, casting aside that gargantuan issue, What Lies Beneath is an effective creeper come thriller that boasts star credentials.

Directed by Zemeckis, formed from an idea by Steven Spielberg (from the story by Sarah Kernochan) and starring Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer as the fragmenting Spencer's. That's a pretty tidy bunch from which to launch your movie. What follows is a mixture of genuine unease and mystery, red herrings and standard boo jump moments, all of which almost gets lost on a saggy middle section as Zemeckis plays Hitchcock one too many times and loses sight of the supernatural heart of the piece, not helped by Clark Gregg's meandering script I might add. None the less, the picture gets pulled around for the finale as the spooky combines with thriller to produce some quality edge of the seat stuff. But it's only then that you totally realise that the makers here have tried to cram too much in to one film. In eagerness to manipulate the audience for the fine ending (though you probably will have it worked out at the half way point) the film just ends up as being confused as to what it mostly wanted to be.

Pfeiffer is excellent and looks stunning and Ford gives it gusto when the script allows. Support comes from Diana Scarwid, Joe Morton, Miranda Otto and James Remar. The house is suitably eerie with its waterside setting and Alan Silvestri's score is perfectly in tune with the creepy elements of the piece. It's a fine enough film in its own right, regardless of the Hitchcockian homages. It's just that it should have been a far better horror picture than it turned out to be. 7/10

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Wuchak

⭐ 6/10

December 24, 2019

***Ghostly happenings in northern Vermont with Ford & Pfeiffer***

A couple living on Lake Champlain (Harrison Ford & Michelle Pfeiffer) face the empty nest syndrome as the wife experiences increasingly spectral happenings. Diana Scarwid, James Remar and Miranda Otto have peripheral roles.

"What Lies Beneath" (2000) is a Hitchcockian drama/mystery with a bit o’ horror. It starts by borrowing from "Rear Window" (1954), but thankfully veers f… read the rest.

tmdb15435519

⭐ 6/10

May 18, 2021

Not a great film, but two things that made it bearable:

1) Directed by Robert Zemeckis

2) I watched it in a hotel room

CinemaSerf

⭐ 6/10

April 4, 2022

"Claire" (Michelle Pfeiffer) and "Norman" (Harrison Ford) are an happily married couple with a lovely lakeside home. It turns out that she has only recently survived a nasty car crash, and so when she starts complaining about some inexplicable things happening in their home, "Norman" suggests that she see a therapist to try to alleviate here ever increasing paranoia. Her friend "Jody" (Diana Scarwid) uses a ouija board and soon "Claire" is convin… read the rest.