A Good Marriage

If you're not looking for cheap thrills and gore, but for low key, understated terror, this is a very good film, with a fantastic couple of leads. LaPaglia is terrifying in his everyday life dull character of the boring accountant and obsessive husband. Allen is also magnificent in her calm, subdued development as a character. I think the low scores are from people expecting a roller coaster unrealistic scary movie with lots of blood and screams. Nothing like this here, rather the little music of human perversity sounding like a distant radio. I love the ending, the power of resilience of so many women.

I read the story before I saw the movie and although there were some changes to the script that I thought were not improvements, I was still surprised to see the film was enjoyable and was a great psychological exploration of what a woman in that horrible dilemma might go through. The story is not about the horrors of serial killers or the supernatural horrors one might expect from King but its about the emotional horror of choosing to live with a secret of unimaginable bearing. I think that the reason many people think this is boring is because that idea went right over their heads. Watch the film amd read the story. Both are great!

I have learned to not go by the reviews of naysayers solely. Weigh the reviews and you can usually tell within the first half hour which way it's going to go. That's what happened and this made for such a good movie. Plot twist was amazing and definitely a Stephen King plot. Enjoyed it. It's not average by a longshot.

A Good Marriage is the latest Stephen King adaptation to hit the film realm and it does so with a splat. Bland direction, hollowed performances and a lazy script propel A Good Marriage from being apart from the rest and instead it sits happily between Sleeping with the Enemy and Cape Fear. The film stars Anthony Lapaglia and Joan Allen as a happily married couple that have their lives turned upside down when the husband is discovered to be a serial killer. This film isn't a terrible film in the least. It is cliché, cookie cutter cinema rehashing what other better films have done in the past. There is nothing new to the story and honestly, it doesn't even seem like King's work. It is lazily written as if it this were meant as a made for TV movie with a slightly bigger budget and a bit more violence and language. Despite some of these negative aspects, the film is still silly entertaining fun. This is a midnight movie type, it isn't good, it isn't bad. It is a film wallowing in mediocrity and it seems to be okay with that.

This movie was not garbage but, it is probably worth skipping or waiting for Netflix. You know when someone tells you a story about something crazy that happened to them and they hit the high points to get to the point and, in the end it doesn't sound that exciting at all? Sure, you nod along because you see how that could be hard or they should be upset but you feel you missed something along the way. This movie hit the high points. The emotion didn't transfer. The story makes sense. The acting is decent and the story plays out the way the trailer leads you to believe it would. There are a few moments of confusion when Darcy (Joan Allen) starts to imagine what would happen if this secret were exposed but, in the end you figure what was and what wasn't and, just generally leave with a feeling of, okay well, it is what it is.