Review of What Lies Beneath (2000) by Michelle M — 18 Jul 2008

I absolutely love this movie. The good old fashioned suspense thriller is possibly my favourite movie genre and What Lies Beneath is - in my opinion - Pure thriller perfection.

I can watch it over and over again and never get bored. The script is excellent and Robert Zemeckis' deceptively simple direction and storytelling brilliance enhance the experience.

Michelle Pfeiffer is my favourite living actress and she puts in a superb performance. I've been a fan ever since I saw her in 'Into The Night' in the 80s, and she delivers the goods here big time.

Like the directing of the movie, her role is deceptively simply, but it's a testament to her ability that she makes everything seem so effortless and believable. Her character goes through a whole range of emotions and never once does her performance seem forced or false.

What Lies Beneath is clearly a genre movie but shouldn't devalue its appeal - it's fantastically entertaining and stands up well to repeat viewings.

I'm still trying to figure out how Zemeckis pulled off one particular shot at the end: *spoiler* Claire is lying on the floor paralysed; the camera starts over her then descends down under the floor and looks up at her from underneath. This all takes place in one fluid movement and it's as if there is no floor and Claire is suspended in mid air.

Of course, it's physically impossible to pull of such a scene in real life, so CGI must be involved. However, it could be that for that particular shot, they built a set with a glass floor and just brought the camera underneath so they could shoot through the floor. That would be much better than a CGI cheat shot.

It's *almost* as good as *that* Zemeckis' shot in 'Contact': Young Ellie discovers her dad (David Morse) collapsed on the floor and races off toward the bathroom to get his pills. As she enters the bathroom the scene changes and you discover you've just viewed everything in the reflection of a mirror. Pure brilliance!

Of course, these sort of things don't really matter when it comes to storytelling; both films succeed without the snazzy camera-work, but it's still fun to try and figure out how they did it.