The Lake House

Released: 06/16/06

Viewed: 5:50pm 06/17/06

Starring: Keanu Reeves, Sandra Bullock, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Christopher Plummer

Directed by: Alejandro Agresti

Warner Brothers Official Site of the movie

In The Lake House two strangers connect across time through a common residence, but the magical connection is never clearly defined. I can’t decide if that’s brave filmmaking or a rookie mistake. The geek in me demands detailed scientific explanations but every other part is willing to let potential plot holes and dead ends fade out behind a beautiful love story.

Sandra Bullock lives in the year 2006. Keanu Reeves lives in 2004. Somehow the two are able to communicate through the mailbox of the house she just moved out of (in 2006) and he just moved into (in 2004). It’s a magical house, or at the very least a magical mailbox, which is nothing to squawk at. Neither star seems to get any junk mail.

We’re meant to wonder what truly connects them, and meant to assume it’s this beautiful house alone. But as the movie progresses and as the two continue to communicate across time, new possibilities arise. Do the two know each other? Would they have met in the first place if it were not for these magical letters? What sort of paradoxes are we creating just talking about this?

Time passes (in both times) and the two come to love each other and eventually want to be together. It may sound easy – just have 2004 Keanu wait 2 years and go to Sandra’s apartment in 2006. But it would be a boring movie if everything worked out.

“Something must have gone wrong.� Sandra reads from Keanu’s 2004 letter. So he attempts to find her. With insight to the future Keanu is able to influence and alter it. More potential paradoxes. But really, that’s the best part of the story. Cause and effect. Seeing how one adjustment changes the outcome. It’s a brilliant plot device that becomes so much more poignant when it’s about love.

Logically I’m a wreck over this film. There are so many unanswered questions that aren’t so much without answer as they are simply undefined. Why did neither of these people consult a psychiatrist. when mystery letters started magically appearing before them? Well, they had both reached rock bottom and were willing to open themselves up to the unexplainable as an escape form reality. Is that the real answer to the question? I don’t know, the movie never says so for sure. But there are dozens of situations like this where the audience is able to decide for themselves and either accept the choices or dismiss them. It’s dangerous, but I think it’s a good move.

A story like this will have people thinking about the movie long after it’s ended. It will evoke theories and discussion going far beyond what the movie only hinted at. I personally woke the morning after and couldn’t get it out of my mind. Yeo admitted the same thing later in the day and we ended up chatting about the possibilities on our long drive home from her parent’s house. I was actually so distracted by the conversation that I missed my exit and ended up driving through the heart of Washington D.C. It’s quite a city!

If you are willing to accept an uncertain science then the movie is quite astounding and that’s high praise considering the story itself is painfully apparent. Without getting into spoilers, the big ending is right in front of you. The real pleasure is the pieces used to get you there.

Sandra and Keanu are both very good and have great chemistry, but are rarely on screen together. There had been a lot of big hype about the stars of Speed finally reuniting after all this time. Loved Speed. Loved The Lake House. Love the duo. Now let’s hope for more. Would it really have been so hard for him to have done Speed 2? I couldn’t even watch that on TV it was so bad.

At its core The Lake House is a true love story. These two people have met and fallen hard for each other but calling the situation “complicated� is an understatement. At one point Sandra refers to it as a “long distance relationship� and everyone in the theater either giggled with delight or rolled their eyes with a bitter sarcasm. Bad puns aside, The Lake House is a smart and charming movie about waiting for what you love. We could all use a little patience.

Rating: 8 out of 10

There are a lot of things to pick apart in The Lake House but as a rare treat that turns out to be a good thing. They give you just enough to make you ask the right questions and decided for yourself. It’s a movie that will leave you with questions but you’ll have a lot of fun trying to answer them.

DVD Worthy?:

Eh, I’m on the fence. I know Yeo would say “No. It’ll be better on TV.� That’s her thing. She loves to watch movies when they come on TV. Even if we own them. I’ve explained to her that she can watch Daddy Day Care any time she wants but she refuses. Just let it come on TV.

So she would say no and my better instincts are telling me to agree with her. If we were just sitting around flipping through channels and stumbled upon The Lake House on Lifetime, we would absolutely freak out. I know. It happens every couple of months when Serendipity or You’ve Got Mail comes on. But it’s the sort of story I’d like to examine further for clues. Maybe it’s not that kind of movie though. We’ll let Lifetime decide.

Trailer Hitch: The Holiday

Oh wow The Holiday looks like a complete train wreck of emotion that will have every woman in America over 50 flocking to theaters in a haze of estrogen and confusion. God, my vagina hurts just thinking about it.

The trailer is about two women, Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet, who become frustrated with their lives and decided to spend their vacations in each other’s shoes. A new place, a new perspective, a complete tear jerking disaster. Even though the ladies attempt to avoid men they get wooed by; Jude Law (sure) and Jack Black (Uh-WHAA!?). Come on, Jack Black with Kate Winslet? Even Irv is out of Jack Black’s league. It’s a completely new role for him though and I’m curious to see if he can pull it off. I’m not sure it’ll be worth sitting through to find out though.

If You liked this movie check out: Frequency

Frequency is awesome. So awesome in fact that it made my list of top 10 sci-fi films from earlier this month. It’s a simple story of family told with a little help from science and fantasy. It’s fast, clever, and as heartwarming as it is action packed. Something for everyone. It parallels The Lake House with communication. In both movies two people connect, communicate, and bond from two different periods in time. Frequency makes a stronger attempt to explain how the connection works but similar holes exist and there’s a certain leap of faith needed from the audience to accept that it’s happening.

Lake House and Frequency both use sci-fi as a launch pad but force it to the background with real stories about people. The people involved in the connection are more important than how the connection came about, and I think most audiences get that.

Vote incentive:

Today’s vote incentive is… well… Where’s the worst place someone could go with today’s comic. I went there. Sorry. If you forgive me please vote at Top Web Comics even though there’s no new incentive. That list is tough to crack, that’s for sure.

Non Movie Related News

Just wanted to show you guys this. I’m still freaked out by how fast Youtube has grown, but when taekwondogirl made a hand puppet of me singing a Who song… I had to check it out. She actually put this up a couple of weeks ago and I wanted to take a moment to say how cool she is for doing it and to officially say - Thanks for making me into a Fandango character. You rule.

Thanks for reading. I’m seeing Superman Returns late tomorrow so the review will go up either really late, or very early the next morning. Until then – make puppets.

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