Robert DeNiro seems intent on ruining what's left of his career by being in poorly constructed and conceived horror movies. First, there was Godsend, now Bobby follows up with another mediocre effort in Hide and Seek. This movie is only partially saved from being complete garbage by Dakota Fanning and one of the alternate endings that you can find on the DVD. In the end, it suffers from the use of what is rapidly becoming the most overused horror film twist of the century.
The story is about a single dad (DeNiro) who's struggling to bring up his daughter (Fanning). She's a troubled little girl who has apparently made up an imaginary friend to help her get cope with her lack of a mother figure. The problem is that Dakota's imaginary friend keeps threatening to hurt people if Daddy doesn't start paying more attention to Dakota. The body count starts to rise when Daddy tries to send Dakota to a shrink and get her to play nice with the local Milf's kid. We are led to believe that Dakota has suffered some kind of psychotic break and she is actually doing all the murderous things that her imaginary friend is doing. Throughout, DeNiro plays the patient and exasperated father, trying so hard to understand how his little girl could be so twisted. But this is exactly where the movie goes wrong. I found it really hard to believe that Daddy would be so understanding when his daughter kills the family cat and then shoves the nice blonde hot Milf lady, Elizabeth Shue, out the window. All dad does is send her to her room with no supper.
It turns out that Daddy's lack of reaction to the murders is because of the big plot twist. If you intend on watching this movie and you want to be surprised... well, you're out of luck. The twist is telegraphed pretty early on. But if you want to try and figure it out for yourself, you should stop reading this review now because here comes the big reveal:
Daddy is actually the imaginary friend.
After this weak I'm-the-killer-and-didn't-know-it revelation, we are expected to buy that Daddy was going around killing the cat and shoving Shue out the window and he was completely oblivious to the fact that he was actually the killer. Oh, how I wish that Hollywood would stop using this device. It's so cheap, and it's such a convenient and weak way of resolving the story. You might as well tell me it was all a dream. These movies make me so angry. Just when I was starting to think that the writer was really going to have to be clever to create a solid resolution, it turns into a Twilight Zone episode. When you lead me down the road through this long, taut thriller and then reveal in the end that there really wasn't a bad guy, it's kind of a letdown. It worked in ANGEL HEART, people. That was like twenty years ago. It has not worked in a horror movie since. Well, I take that back. It worked in HAUTE TENSION, but it doesn't work in IDENTITY, SECRET WINDOW, THE MACHINIST and especially not in HIDE AND SEEK.
This lame reveal is so cliché now that I don't even know if you could consider it a twist at all. In fact, I think that this twist might be my new pet peeve, worse even than the Occurrence at Owl Creek I'm-Dead-and-Don't-Know-it reveal. Yes, I think that the I'm-the-killer reveal is just a little bit worse. Like I mentioned at the start of this review, there are several alternate endings that are included on the DVD. There is one ending with Dakota Fanning that almost pulls this movie out of the fire. It still doesn't excuse the use of this tired old twist, but it made me feel less angry. In fact, the alternate ending is the only thing that kept me from giving this movie one star.
The story is about a single dad (DeNiro) who's struggling to bring up his daughter (Fanning). She's a troubled little girl who has apparently made up an imaginary friend to help her get cope with her lack of a mother figure. The problem is that Dakota's imaginary friend keeps threatening to hurt people if Daddy doesn't start paying more attention to Dakota. The body count starts to rise when Daddy tries to send Dakota to a shrink and get her to play nice with the local Milf's kid. We are led to believe that Dakota has suffered some kind of psychotic break and she is actually doing all the murderous things that her imaginary friend is doing. Throughout, DeNiro plays the patient and exasperated father, trying so hard to understand how his little girl could be so twisted. But this is exactly where the movie goes wrong. I found it really hard to believe that Daddy would be so understanding when his daughter kills the family cat and then shoves the nice blonde hot Milf lady, Elizabeth Shue, out the window. All dad does is send her to her room with no supper.
It turns out that Daddy's lack of reaction to the murders is because of the big plot twist. If you intend on watching this movie and you want to be surprised... well, you're out of luck. The twist is telegraphed pretty early on. But if you want to try and figure it out for yourself, you should stop reading this review now because here comes the big reveal:
Daddy is actually the imaginary friend.
After this weak I'm-the-killer-and-didn't-know-it revelation, we are expected to buy that Daddy was going around killing the cat and shoving Shue out the window and he was completely oblivious to the fact that he was actually the killer. Oh, how I wish that Hollywood would stop using this device. It's so cheap, and it's such a convenient and weak way of resolving the story. You might as well tell me it was all a dream. These movies make me so angry. Just when I was starting to think that the writer was really going to have to be clever to create a solid resolution, it turns into a Twilight Zone episode. When you lead me down the road through this long, taut thriller and then reveal in the end that there really wasn't a bad guy, it's kind of a letdown. It worked in ANGEL HEART, people. That was like twenty years ago. It has not worked in a horror movie since. Well, I take that back. It worked in HAUTE TENSION, but it doesn't work in IDENTITY, SECRET WINDOW, THE MACHINIST and especially not in HIDE AND SEEK.
This lame reveal is so cliché now that I don't even know if you could consider it a twist at all. In fact, I think that this twist might be my new pet peeve, worse even than the Occurrence at Owl Creek I'm-Dead-and-Don't-Know-it reveal. Yes, I think that the I'm-the-killer reveal is just a little bit worse. Like I mentioned at the start of this review, there are several alternate endings that are included on the DVD. There is one ending with Dakota Fanning that almost pulls this movie out of the fire. It still doesn't excuse the use of this tired old twist, but it made me feel less angry. In fact, the alternate ending is the only thing that kept me from giving this movie one star.