Once upon a time, there was a family. They lived in the city. The city was just so damn crowded! "Hold your sister's hand!" the father insisted. But the kid didn't listen. Here comes an SUV. Splat!!! (Almost.)

"Let's move to the country," they said. And away they went. Husband told the wife to take a year off and write a book. Wish I could.

Here it is, Cold Creek Manor! Big old house, though, isn't it. How many barrels of 409 will it take to clean this place up? Ah, who cares. It's big. It's scary. It's ours.

About ten minutes into Cold Creek Manor, I started to wonder if I had wandered into the wrong movie. There seemed to be nothing even remotely pertaining to a big old house in the boonies. Just the rattling bleep of an alarm clock to start things off (sounded EXACTLY like mine), a late rush to the school, and a near-accident. Finally, when the Philosophy of Moviemaking declared that the maximum amount of time for an introduction had been spent, then away they went at the 12:35 mark (give or take five minutes).

Aw, but first they had to just LOOK at the house, not actually buy it. That's okay, though, 'cause we could just skip up to them moving in. (I'm actually glad they did.) There's a lot of skipping through time in this movie, and also too much time spent on unnecessary subplots like the one with the horny business guy in an airplane. But hey, it IS Sharon Stone. (I thought it was Tea Leoni. Go figure.)

Wow, so far the scenery is gorgeous. Not a lot of clues seem to be popping up, just quasi-nude Polaroids. That's okay, I'm probably just missing them again. We already know that there's something about the family that used to live here, we're just not sure what. Cooper (Dennis Quaid) is working on that, though. I hope it's not another one of these ghost stories, those are so cliche. That stuff just doesn't happen, so enough already!

Then, Dale Massie shows up. He's one of the people who used to live in the house. He just got out of jail after three years. He's looking for a job. Hmmm, I know someone kind of like this. The family offers it to him, and things seem to be fine, until the snakes start showing up.

The snakes come and go, but the conflicts go on. Dale tells an entire restaurant all about how horrible this guy Cooper is for buying his house and making documentaries about him and his family, while Cooper and his family are sitting right there in a booth. Talk about awkward. Here's the crazy part -- they actually listen! But what are they gonna do?

Then there's Dale's father. Wow, what a strange old hermit. He sits in a hospital bed and eats chocolate covered cherries. Cooper pays the guy a visit, but nothing the guy says seems to make any sense at all. Something about the Devil's Throat.

Well, as you can see, there's quite a bit of a mess going on in Cold Creek Manor. I see this movie taking all kinds of flak, but for reasons that are tough to nail, I actually enjoyed it. While the movie was predictable for the most part, there are a lot of things about the movie that I'm sure nobody was expecting. Like that there are no ghosts. Like that there is no magic incantation that has to be spoken, or video tape that has to be copied, or light that has to be cast, or disappearing pig trick that needs to be performed, or glass of water that has to be spilled. This is just plain old one human being against another, no cheating, no easy way out. There's just not enough of that these days.

Stephen Dorff smokes it, man. I don't normally watch for good acting jobs, but Dorff inhaled the role of Dale Massie and spit it out like a wad of chewed tobacco. The ladies seem to like that he took his shirt off, so incase you haven't heard, yeah he does.

Dennis Quaid could be Bill Paxton's twin brother for all we know. He was also great as he's ever been, venturing deeper into the pit of anger than he has in a while. He must be a big fan of Canned Heat's song "On The Road Again", because this is the second movie now this decade where he's had a scene in a bar with this song playing. You get to hear a lot more of it here than in Frequency. Sharon Stone is pretty much the stereotypical female character in these things; she does a great job with what she has, but it doesn't seem to be much of a challenge.

Kristen Stewart from Panic Room plays the daughter Kristen (hey, that must've been easy) who ditches cell phones for horses in a rushed growth, but it's still kinda neat. She's going places, no matter what they say. Ryan Wilson (not affiliated with the Beach Boys as far as I know) plays the son Jesse with ease.

I thought Dana Eskelson did a uniquely understated performance as Sheriff Ferguson. She has a real natural flair; every scene with her was made that much better by her glowing presence. Not too often these days that you get a character who calls someone a "piece of sh!t" anymore; they're too caught up in the F word, I guess, to realize the power of the poop.

Aside from all that I've mentioned thus far, though, Cold Creek Manor is mostly predictable and banal. It moves like molasses in January. However, what it lacks in originality, it makes up for in beautiful scenery, nice acting jobs, a hilarious line about a DVD, the Canned Heat song, and the fact that at one point, you may very well feel genuine sympathy for the bad guy. A lot of people in my crowd did.

I'll say the same thing I said with Basic, because although I wouldn't recommend Cold Creek Manor to most people I know, I would not, given the chance, tell my past self to pass on it.


Recommended:
Yes

Video Occasion: Better than Watching TV
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age