4/10

When her husband, Bob (Anthony LaPaglia) of more than twenty years is away on one of his business trips, Darcy Anderson (Joan Allen) looks for batteries in the garage. Instead, she discovers the stranger inside her husband who she never knew. It’s a horrifying discovery, that turns Darcy’s world upside down. A Good Marriage is the newest Stephen King adaptation that is directed by Peter Askin. Askin does some things right in this film, but he does so much wrong to render it completely empty of any heart pounding drama or artsy violence. That is the biggest problem that i found with this film; it struggles to find an identity in 97 minutes of screen time. The first act is set up well enough with the shocking discovery, but the movie sputters out over the middle act when it doesn’t seem to know where to take our main characters. Darcy plays alright with the notion that her husband is a killer which is extremely absurd because he isn’t blackmailing her or keeping her there for any reason. The only link they have together is the three children who are all grown up, and have left the nest. The final act starts to pick up some of that good storytelling in the opening 20 minutes, but we are fed a showdown that is neither satisfying nor progressive. The point of no return is over before any of the audience can even enjoy it. This gives it a rushed kind of feeling that i didn’t see coming in a film that is barely an hour and a half. The acting is done about as well as can be asked considering the characters are written like blank pieces of paper. Allen in particular continues her longstanding history of powerful female characters who find the strengths they didn’t know they had. There was a second in the film when i was hoping Bob would find out the same thing about Darcy as she did about him, but it never materializes. I think a horror themed “Mr and Mrs Smith” would make for a great film with king of weird writing Stephen King at the helm. It certainly would’ve made for a better film than the one we got. After the showdown, the film still has 20 long minutes with so many false endings that it gets put back on the shelf of mediocrity. It’s a shame too. The camera work is done brilliantly for many shadow shots. There is also great shading inside of the house that just begs for that shade of red that we never see. No blood in a Stephen King writing is like no buildings falling down in a Michael Bay film. That is the central problem with calling this film a “Horror movie”. There is no blood, little violence, and nothing to ever make us hate Bob’s character enough to cheer Darcy on to get out of it. The movie never really feels like a Stephen King movie because it’s missing his touch. Lapaglia is a great method actor, and i think he would’ve been great in a role similar to “Mr Brooks”, but that isn’t what he is given here. He plays a killer more generic than a Lifetime Television movie of the week. I begged for a dominant twist in his actions when the shoe drops that he is a killer, but i was sadly disappointed. It’s simple to write off A Good Marriage as a boring film, but that isn’t quite the case. There is a good idea here with a good film just begging to be let out. I wish King would’ve been more hands on with this film, as i feel he knows better than anyone what gives his audience goosebumps as the master of suspense. The lack of that last word is what inevitably dooms this straight to DVD film to a lifetime of dull emptiness. If you are a HUGE Stephen King fan, then maybe you won’t mind spending a dollar on this at the local Redbox. I don’t think there is any harm in it, but you won’t find anything special when comparing it to other films that King let someone else helm the director’s chair. A Good Marriage offers great on screen chemistry from Lapaglia and Allen, but it’s story is much thinner than i expected after watching the trailer.