A
woman about to embark on a career as a ‘cellist gives up her
interest in music to marry a brilliant scientist, who occupies
the DuPont Chair of Genetics at the University of Vermont.
The couple have a daughter, to whom the mother is so devoted
that she cries when she sees her daughter off to college.
Indeed, the mother is so absorbed into the role of being a
good wife and mother that she fails to question why her husband
is spending so much time at the office with his research project
and thus is unaware that her husband has been carrying on
an affair with one of his students, who disappears one day.
Such is the set up for What Lies Beneath, directed
by Robert Zemeckis. Professor Norman Spencer (played by Harrison
Ford) has a secret to hide, but his wife Claire (played by
Michelle Pfeiffer) experiences supernatural manifestations
in their beautiful house in Addison, Vermont, about an hour
commute from the university, alongside Lake Champlain. She
does so only after their daughter leaves home, so the professor
arranges for Claire to see a psychiatrist, who suspects the
"empty nest" syndrome. According to the tagline, "He was the
perfect husband until his one mistake followed them home."
As the plot develops, we view Hitchcock’s Greatest Hits, with
familiar clichés from past movies. It does not take long to
figure out that Norman (Bates?) has killed the student who
once followed him home, whereupon the suspense shifts to how
he will dispose of his wife, who is gradually putting the
pieces of the puzzle together, thanks to clues supplied by
the ghost of the dead student. The music, however, amplifies
the suspense in what is otherwise a slow-moving film with
much silence, and the Vermont scenes provide a magnificent
cinematic postcard. Without giving away the ending, the story
clearly indicates that women make big mistakes when they give
up their identities in marriage. Not only do they become less
attractive to their husbands but they are easily dominated
and thus overwhelmed when unpleasant facts about their spouses
come to light. MH
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