I appear on “CTV News at 6” with anchor Andria Case to talk about the psychological drama “Heel,” the giant snake movie “Beware Boiúna” and the thriller “Verity.”
Watch ther whole thing HERE! (Starts at 37:32)
I join “CTV News Toronto at Five” with anchor Zuraidah Alman to talk about the absurdist environmental dramedy “Digger,” the suburban gothic “Verity” and the psychological thriller “Heel.”
Watch the whole thing HERE! (Starts at 13:15)
I join CTV Atlantic’s Bruce Frisko to talk about the absurdist environmental dramedy “Digger,” the suburban gothic “Verity” and the psychological thriller “Heel.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
Watch the whole thing HERE!
CAST: Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson, Josh Hartnett, Ismael Cruz Córdova, Alex Cooper. Directed by Michael Showalter.
REVIEW: Although released in the fall, “Verity” is the equivalent of a summer beach read.
Based on Colleen Hoover’s novel of the same name, “Verity” sees Dakota Johnson as struggling writer Lowen Ashleigh. Broke and facing eviction, she is in bad need of a job.
The gig as a ghostwriter for Verity Crawford (Anne Hathaway), a bestselling author of thrillers who has been left immobilized and unresponsive after a terrible car accident, offers Lowen the chance to start anew at the author’s isolated Vermont estate.
At the house while sorting through Verity’s notes, Lowen uncovers what she thinks is an autobiography. The manuscript, however, is more than a straightforward look at Verity’s life. On the pages, in stark black and white, are what appear to be intimate details to the author’s culpability in her family’s tragedies. “A writer’s words should be honest and bloody and a little bit terrifying.”
In a quest for the truth, Lowen is drawn into a world of obsession where real life and fiction are tangled.
“Verity” breathes the same suburban Gothic air as “The Housemaid,” but has none of the delirious spirit that made the Amanda Seyfried/Sydney Sweeney movie a silly and steamy crowd pleaser.
There are twists and turns aplenty, but very few shocks in this talky, deliberately paced movie. Like Daphne du Maurier on quaaludes, it plods through the story of truth vs. fiction as though the set was filled with molasses. Fans of the novel may enjoy seeing Hoover’s famous “headboard sex scene” brought to life, (VERY MILD SPOILER AHEAD) but the core notion that a compelling narrative trumps facts feels forced and, by the time we get to it, morally ambiguous.
Of the top line cast only Hathaway dives in, providing a darkly theatrical turn. Seen mostly in flashbacks, she’s mean and menacing with a touch of camp.
When she is on screen, mouth bloodied after biting her lover or happily unplugging her children’s baby monitors, “Verity” comes alive, only then to be deadened by the surrounding turgid storytelling.
