The Lake House's Recent Activity - Spout

Film:The Lake House

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 17:41:46 GMT

Title: The Lake House
Year: 2006
Director: Alejandro Agresti
Plot: Two people develop an unusual relationship that bends the boundaries of time and place in this romantic fantasy. Kate Forster (Sandra Bullock) is a doctor who lives in a beautiful home by a lake. Forced to move elsewhere, she requests that any correspondence that arrives at the lake house be passed on to her new address. To her surprise, she soon receives a romantic note from Alex Burnham (Keanu Reeves), an architect who lives in the cottage she once called home. However, a look at the postmark on the letter reveals that he lived at the home two years before she did, and that somehow they've come in contact with one another through a space in time. A remake of Lee Hyun-seung's acclaimed Korean romance Il Mare (aka Siworae), The Lake House was the first American production from Argentinean filmmaker Alejandro Agresti; the supporting cast includes Christopher Plummer, Dylan Walsh, and Lynn Collins. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Times Tagged: 39
Number of Lists: 24
Number of blog posts: 7
Number of discussion threads: 1
SpoutRating: 3

Spout Post: The Lake House (2006)

Mon, 09 Jun 2008 17:23:25 GMT

Post By: JJ79
Post To: JJ79 Blog
Post Date: 6/9/2008 1:23:25 PM
Body: Tell me if this sounds at all familiar: a down-on-her-luck doctor falls for a manual labor guy, only to have their romance interrupted by some bizarre twists. "The Lake House" is a movie we´ve all seen many times before and, at the same time, it´s also a movie we´ve never seen prior. When Alex (Keanu Reeves) moves into a gorgeous house on a lake (hence the name of the movie, "The Lake House"), he begins to correspond with Kate (Sandra Bullock), a doctor who has just moved from the home. She has a simple request, at first: please forward her mail to a new address in Chicago if any should get through the Post Office. He agrees to and, through their letters, the two learn a very eerie truth: they are living roughly two years apart from each other; she is in the year 2006 and he in 2004. In the course of their correspondence, they slowly learn they have been a part of each other´s lives for quite some time, from kissing at her birthday party to the aforementioned house. Obviously, the dilemma is how can these two people who supposedly love each other make their relationship work when they´ve never seen one another, let alone touched? "The Lake House" is equal parts romance and science fiction. It´s not science fiction in the vein of "Star Wars" or "Planet of the Apes", but rather in the vein of "Frequency". The sci-fi aspects of the plot are necessary for the story, but they don´t overtake it. However, the sci-fi here is more dubious than anything seen in "Frequency". At least in that movie, the filmmakers tried to rationalize away their sci-fi conceits; here, nobody tries to explain what´s going on. It´s just accepted and never really thought of again. What is this magic mailbox? Why does it allow these two people from two different times to communicate with each other? And, really, isn´t it true that changing history, whether it be future history or past history, will cause other changes throughout time? (That question was the whole basis for "The Butterfly Effect".) Nobody bothers to answer, let alone ask those questions. It´s as if talking with someone in another time is commonplace in their reality. We, the audience, know it´s not since many characters express disbelief at what Kate and Alex are going through. That in and of itself is not that major of a stumble. Bigger problems involve the lack of chemistry between Bullock and Reeves and the seemingly obvious lack of logic on the parts of the two leads. Both of the main actors have been off the Hollywood radar screen for a while. Why they both chose this vehicle as their "comeback" of sorts is beyond me. Reeves, for as much as he tries, isn´t cut out to be a leading romantic man. He still suffers from the "Woah" syndrome he acquired during "The Matrix". And Bullock constantly looks as though she´s trying to figure out the plot while reciting her lines. There´s no pop to their scenes together. Admittedly, there are only a handful of these times; more often than not, they are talking to each other using a split screen rather than being face to face. It is surprising that both of these actors headed the action film "Speed" more than a couple years ago and kept that entire endeavor afloat, basically, on their own. Why they couldn´t buoy this feature is beyond me. There seems to be a directing message to both indicating they need to be as down and expressionless as possible. Even in what is supposed to be one of the most emotional scenes in the movie (the death of Alex´s father…which Kate does try to warn him about; more on that in a second), Bullock´s voiceover contains no emotion, sadness, hurt or empathy it needs to. It´s as if she´s reading a letter. Come to think of it, that´s exactly what she´s doing and, on that count, the direction works wonderfully. When reading a letter (or e-mail in this day and age), you never can be entirely sure of a person´s emotion. So, since she is merely saying what Alex is reading, it might be understandable for the voice over to be emotionless. Logical or not, I still don´t like it. As for that plot point about Alex´s father (Christopher Plummer) dying, one has to wonder what world these two people live in. Neither of them does the smart thing, which would have been doing an internet search for the other. They have full names and an address to work with. Google it, Yahoo it…heck, even go look at public records. Of course, doing so would have ended the story before it got going. Had Kate done that, she would have seen when the father died and, for that matter, what Alex´s fate would be. I don´t mind alluding to what it is because, in a movie like this, there are limited possibilities. Which brings us back to the inevitable and unenviable task of trying to make sense of temporal paradoxes. Don´t bother. You´ll run yourself ragged trying to make sense of what we´re given here. In some respects, the subplots are more interesting than the main story: Kate moving to a Chicago hospital, Alex and his family and so on. Using a mailbox as a time travel device is a unique idea, akin to the use of a telephone booth on "Dr. Who". But I have to wonder: isn´t there a mailman who opens that mailbox on a regular basis? Doesn´t this person see the letters or put mail in and, thus, move the flag on the box? It´s called logic, folks. Also falling under this heading is why Kate would travel from Chicago to the house in order to exchange letters with Alex. From what I understand, this is a long journey. There is evidence to back that assumption. She moves into the city to take a job in Chicago City Hospital. If it wasn´t that long a trip, wouldn´t she have stayed at the lake house if she loved it so much? She isn´t willing to live there anymore, but freely runs there to drop a letter in the mailbox to a man in her past? As a romance, "The Lake House" fails. As a science fiction movie, it also fails. Too bad, there was actual potential here.

Spout Post: A Prairie Home Companion - The Lake House

Wed, 18 Jul 2007 23:56:00 GMT

Post By: MovieBabe
Post To: MovieBabe Blog
Post Date: 7/18/2007 7:56:00 PM
Body: By Tricia Olszewski A Prairie Home Companion was created for—and by—the kind of people who still appreciate the olde-fashioned longing in lyrics such as “Come and sit by my side if you love me/Do not hasten to bid me adieu.” That couplet, from trad-folk number “Red River Valley,” closes the film, a reflection on nostalgia and the end of things beloved written by Garrison Keillor and directed by Robert Altman. From the former, you’d expect as much. From the latter, you have to wonder: Is this a part of the American experience he really needs to be bothering with? Based on Keillor’s identically titled and, at 31 years, still-running NPR program, the loose narrative involves the final episode of a modern-day radio variety show, touching on soured love affairs and unspooling a significant subplot about death. It’s impossible not to consider that this may be the 81-year-old Altman’s swan song, as well—Paul Thomas Anderson was, somewhat morbidly, contracted as a backup director. It’s also impossible not to imagine that the film seems so resonant partly because its themes have been running through the legend’s head for a while now—that he has, in fact, good reason to be bothering. “Every show is your last show—that’s my philosophy,” intones compulsive yarn-teller Keillor when a disbeliever blurts that this can’t really be the end. Indeed, the easily distracted G.K., as the self-portraying Keillor is nicknamed here, is unflappably matter-of-fact about the death of his show—and, later, the death of a performer—especially among the largely cooing cast and crew. Among the sentimental are the Lunch Lady (Marylouise Burke), who laments that she’s never going to see anyone again; sister act Yolanda and Rhonda Johnson (Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin), who go on (and on) about the old times with the rest of their family, as Yolanda’s uninterested daughter, Lola (Lindsay Lohan, stepping up to the task) scribbles poems about suicide in her notebook; and hairdresser Donna (Sue Scott), who complains that without the program, radio will have officially gone to hell. Given the circumstances, Donna might as well be talking about society in general: The station that broadcasts the Companion, formerly family-run, has been bought by a corporation (represented by Tommy Lee Jones as hatchet man Axeman). The company plans to tear down Minnesota’s Fitzgerald Theater—where Keillor’s real show is performed—to make way for a parking lot. A Prairie Home Companion’s real message, however, isn’t that no one is promised another sunrise. It’s that endings ought not to be merely grieved but also welcomed as opportunities to remember the good times the expired person/job/activity provided. Maudlin? Maybe. But the film confines the sorrow to the backstage as, out front, we get a nearly real-time episode of the show. The performances, heavy on banjo-driven, Carter Family–style music and backed by Keillor’s own band, are jubilant, including the one by Dusty (Woody Harrelson) and Lefty (John C. Reilly), a singing-cowboy duo who giddily exchange terrible jokes while strumming their guitars. G.K. is impressive both for his banter, which includes between-song ads (the best is a rapturous ad-lib for duct tape), and for the seeming effortlessness with which he keeps the show moving regardless of what’s going on around him. Much of the film is classic Altman, including a camera that flows through walls and even a ceiling and conversations that overlap—though at times to a hair-pulling degree, especially between Yolanda and Lola, with Streep and Tomlin replicating their irritating version of the directorial trademark from this year’s Oscars. More successful is Kevin Kline as Guy Noir, a ’40s-style gumshoe complete with sharp suit and sharper dialogue who’s an imaginary character on the real PHC. Here, he’s a klutzy security guard with private-dick pretensions. His biggest oops is losing track of Dangerous Woman, who drifts around the staging area in a white trench coat. Played by Virginia Madsen, the character is initially more ponderous than mysterious, slowly delivering such eye-rolling lines as “Every sparrow is remembered.” She’s somewhat redeemed, however, when her reason for showing up is revealed and she tries to reverse the show’s prospects with a shocking yet arguably merited bit of advice to one of the characters. A Prairie Home Companion is an imperfect meditation, to be sure, but it’s also an exuberant one. It shouldn’t seem this fun. The film’s great achievement is that it makes you face the gloomiest facts of life head-on—and then lets you walk out with a smile. As swan songs go, it could be a lot worse. On the other side of the sentimentality spectrum is The Lake House, an atrocious romantic drama starring Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves. It’s slow-moving, unengaging, and ultimately unsatisfying. Yet the movie should be recognized for its one dubious achievement: matching the manufactured preciousness of director Alejandro Agresti’s previous release, Valentín, a semiautobiographical tale about an 8-year-old boy who’s such a little man he bickers with his grandmother about the tailoring of his pant legs. The new movie’s story isn’t exactly original, but this time the director has someone besides himself to blame. A Korean film, Il Mare was the basis for Proof writer David Auburn’s screenplay about a couple who fall in love via a wrinkle in time. Kate (Bullock), a doctor, is moving out of her ridiculous glass-walled , uh, lake house to take a job at a Chicago hospital. She leaves a note for Alex (Reeves), the new resident, apologizing for a couple of inherited-with-the-house details and asking him to forward any mail to her new address. Alex writes Kate back—putting the letter in his mailbox, which is, God knows how, where Kate knows to look for it when she takes a drive back to the country on her day off. He says that he doesn’t see either of the things she’s mentioned. Eventually, they begin to bicker about which one of them is crazy, because their respective letters—always left in his mailbox—are dated wrong. Kate’s say 2006. Alex’s say 2004. So, naturally, they fall in love. Really, there’s no basis for their, um, long-distance romance besides the whoa-inducing realization that...they’re both right! Soon, each is asking about the other’s likes, which cringingly include stuff way too closely related to sunsets, puppies, and long walks on the beach. Meanwhile, they bemoan to themselves and others how isolated they’ve let themselves become. Kate plays chess with the dog. Alex, an architect like his father (Christopher Plummer), points out to his nearly purposeless brother (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) that the house we discover his pop built is just a glass box, completely disconnecting its occupant from the world. Agresti mostly has the characters communicate in voice-over as they pen their missives, but occasionally he’ll show them merely talking to each other, whether separately or, ghostlike, in the same place. It doesn’t matter—these long conversations are Snoozeville, often featuring lines like “I could be a shoulder for you like you’ve been for me” and such overly obvious musical cues as Paul McCartney’s “This Never Happened Before” and Carole King’s “It’s Too Late.” You’d do well to keep the latter in mind if you’re considering heading to the theater: In reality, you can’t travel through time to retrieve your $10.

Spout Post: Built on Sand

Mon, 02 Jul 2007 13:25:05 GMT

Post By: dj4our
Post To: dj4our Blog
Post Date: 7/2/2007 9:25:05 AM
Body: THE LAKE HOUSE *PG for some language and a disturbing image.1 hr. 38 min.written by: David Auburn (screenplay), Jina Yeoh & Eun-Jeong Kimproduced by: Doug Davison & Roy Leedirected by: Alejandro AgrestiTake two mediocre actors who rarely take risks anymore and give them a lame remake script and see if the sparks fly. Well, they don't fly, they don't even spark. You gotta be an obsessive fan of both Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves to like this film, let alone stay awake through it. Someone thought that because these two were in 1994's ";Speed" that they had chemistry. Wrong! If ya can't guess the ending of this film in the first 15 minutes than ya must have been distracted by the paint chips peeling off yer wall. Ya just can't find an intelligent time-spanning romance anymore. This movie made me long for Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour. It's too bad this is a remake of the Korean film 2000's "Il Mare" cuz it woulda been better if this tepid romance had any association to any previous film.On a winter morning in 2006, Dr. Kate Forster (Sandra Bullock) is moving out of a beautiful lake house (built outta glass resting on stilts right on the lake. Kinda cool) for a job at a Chicago hospital.. She leaves a note for the next tenant asking them to forward her mail to her new address. She writes about the paw prints on the front path and the box in the attic. Off she goes to hr new city flat. A young architect named Alex Wyler (Keanu Reeves) is the new tenant of the lake house, who's working construction of a new complex of houses at the city outskirts. Alex finds the lake house kinda rundown with no paw prints to be found. After reading Kate's letter, he forgets about what he read until a coupla days later when a stray dog runs across the freshly painted front path, leaving paw prints where Kate's letter said they'd be. Cue the X-Files theme music. He writes her back and places his letter in the mailbox and the two of them eventually discover that they are separated in time by two years, with him being in 2004. Regardless of how absurd this seems, the two continue their time-crossing correspondence via magic lake house mailbox. In between all their handwriting bondage, we see them go through the motions of their separate lives. Kate is getting acclimated to long hospital hours at the fictitious Chicago City Hospital. Her lead doctor there Dr. Klyczynski (Shohreh Aghdashloo), shows her the ropes as she tries to befriend Kate. This friendship is shown when she tries to comfort Kate after she fails to save the life of "some guy" getting smacked by a bus on her lunch break at Daley Plaza. Back in 2004, we see that Alex has a estranged relationship with his father, Simon Wyler (Christopher Plummer) a famous architect. These characters are there to hopefully flesh out the characters of Kate and Alex but honestly these actors are so much more interesting that I almost wish it was these older actors falling in love. With Aghdashloo's sexy voice and Plummer's stoic charisma that mighta been something. But, alas we're stuck with mopey (Kate) and mopier (Alex).They start to build a relationship thru mail (while I start to gag, sorry) and it would seem they are trying to convince the viewer that they are falling for each other. Ugh. Could they ever meet each other? Ever? Now, since Kate is in the future she can tell Alex where to find her in her past and his present. Kate comes up with a plan that may hopefully bring them together. She tells Alex that she left a gift for her father (a paperback of Jane Austen's "Persuasion") at the Metra Riverside train stop where she was meeting her then lover, Morgan (a wasted Dylan Walsh). She asks Alex to go there and retrieve this gift and somehow find away to return it to her in the future. I'd tell her to go suck a rock. Guess what? Alex finds the paperback and briefly sees long-haired Kate look out the window of her departing train. Sucker! So, now he has this book but he doesn't put it in their magical mailbox. Nope. He tells her that he will find away to return it to her in person. Aw....So, how do they hook up? Well, in 2004, that stray dog that happened to belong to both of them (poor dog) was hanging with Alex on his construction site and runs away from him as his desperate co-worker Mona (Lynn Collins) tries to make some moves on clueless Keanu. They follow the dog to a house that Morgan happens to live in (I gotta thank that dog for propelling the plot, cuz so far this is one dragged-out snoozer) and for some reason he invites them to a birthday party for Kate. At the party, Alex introduces himself to past-Kate since he's been corresponding with in the future-Kate. The two wind up with a dance and a lip-smacking rendezvous outside the party, witnessed by Morgan and Mona. Busted. Determined to bridge the distance between them at last and unravel the mystery behind their extraordinary connection, they tempt fate by arranging to meet. After a failed attempt at a date at a phony, fancy restaurant at Millennium Park called Il Mare, (wonder where they got that title from?) in 2006, Kate retreats, believing she will never have happiness. She urges Alex to move on. Do they eventually meet up? Yeah? Does that bus incident at Daley Plaza come back into the story. Uh huh. Is this a predictable sap-fest of a movie? You betcha.Reeves and Bullock are a lovey-dovey duo with the kind of low-key chemistry that doesn't depend on anything but witty, unnatural banter. Instead, they just happen to go together. They were better together via magic mail box. I'm not really a fan of either actor but since the movie was filmed in Chicago (I saw them filming it. See pic below) and it had two decent supporting actors in Aghdashloo & Plummer, I thought I'd give the disc a spin. I never saw the original and this movie made me lose any interest in doing so and that's too bad cuz it just has to be better than this. I'll give credit to European director Alejandro Agresti and Director of Photography, Alar Kivilo for at least making the film look good. But, then again that's cuz they chose a great city to film in. Yes, one of the better stars of this movie is Chicago. There's a certain calm and vibrance in the city that attempts to revive the film. Sadly, that isn't enough. This movie is unfortunately a decent Lifetime movie at it's best. If you and you're significant other are home sick and this happens to be on TV, check it out as you both check out. What the heck was Ebert sniffin'?

Spout Post: Cute

Wed, 02 May 2007 01:31:00 GMT

Post By: gothere
Post To: You should go there
Post Date: 5/1/2007 9:31:00 PM
Body: I turned this movie on as background noise for email and found it surprisingly pleasant. Beside being the obvious romance clichés, The Lake House was relatively quiet and highlighted vaguely nostalgic music that was comforting. Or at least allowed me to follow along while checking email – sort of. The plot had some strange, unexplainable twists any time-bending fiction requires. Still, it was cute, and if you're in the mood for a quiet, romantic film with a 60s-esque soundtrack, give it a try.

Spout Post: love does defeats time...

Wed, 14 Feb 2007 09:00:00 GMT

Post By: forrest_gump
Post To: forrest_gump Blog
Post Date: 2/14/2007 4:00:00 AM
Body: how much can love do? can it defeat time?can it bring back your dearest one? the lake house depicts this fact..it is first a love story than a science fiction(lol) When Chicago doctor Kate Forster (Bullock) vacates the spectacular lake house she's been renting for a few months, she leaves the next tenant a welcome note. When architect Alex Wyler (Reeves) arrives at the lake house, he finds the note left by Kate. The odd thing, however, is the date on the letter: it's 2006. For Alex, 2004 has just begun and the house has been abandoned for years. He thinks it's a practical joke, and he leaves the "trespasser" a note. When Kate, needing a brief break from the stress in Chicago, returns to the lake house, she finds the note, and she writes back.Soon, they realize that they exist in two different times, exactly two years apart. Their only connection with each other is the magical mailbox and the letters they leave for each other. Through their letters, they start to get to know each other. Curious, Alex crosses path with Kate in 2004, who obviously doesn't know him and is living with her boyfriend Morgan (Dylan Walsh). The love between Alex in 2004 and Kate in 2006 grows as they continue to confide in each other. Soon, Kate decides that she must meet Alex in 2006 and settle this once and for all.Speed made Bullock (Crash) a star and Reeves (Constantine) a bona fide action hero. It's interesting to see them get together again in a romance-fantasy. Bullock still does her lonely, girl-next-door part justice. She's radiant, lovely(seems bit aged!!), yet vulnerable and guarded. Reeves is, as usual, cool and dashing, yet surprisingly expressive in some key scenes. Twelve years later, Bullock and Reeves still share tremendous chemistry with each other, and that's quite phenomenal when you consider they only have two scenes together. In a romance, chemistry counts for everything. The script by David Auburn (Proof) is based on the Korean film Siworae (2000) written by Eun-Jeong Kim. The story makes an interesting decision to not explain the magic of the mailbox and how the time rip comes to be. The audience must simply accept the premise; thus, the movie sets up an expectation: Alex asks Kate, "Is this really happening?" and Kate answers, "Why not?" Likewise, we must also believe in the magic of love, that anything could happen. The timeline is a little confusing and we must pay attention or else we would get lost. As with any stories dealing with time-space continuum, there is a number of inconsistencies, logical flaws and plot holes. For example, the bits about the tree and the book are too sentimental and silly, they defy logic. And we must ask, have they ever heard of e-mail and Google? However, none of these flaws are fatal, and it doesn't really affect our enjoyment of the story in any negative way.While the plot is somewhat predictable, it doesn't feel cliched or overtly sentimental and sweet, which is a bonus, considering how many romance stories fail because of that. The incident near the beginning is an obvious foreshadow, but it sets up the rest of the film nicely, making us want to find out how the story unfolds and concludes. The ending also makes perfect sense to me, and I must say it's one of the best time-defying love stories I have seen, and I'm not easily impressed by love stories. For the hopeless romantics, The Lake House is fine and satisfying.

Spout Post: Movie Marathon-The Lake House

Sun, 05 Nov 2006 00:06:00 GMT

Post By: spoutgirl
Post To: spoutgirl Blog
Post Date: 11/4/2006 8:06:00 PM
Body: What a wonderfuly weird, crazy, lovely, amazingly well done movie. I didn't expect much from this going into it, but I am just so pleasantly suprised by how much I liked it. I am left wondering, if you give time a chance, will it bring you the person you were meant to spend the rest of your life with? Realizing that there is no way that this situation could ever be possible, I think that the real story behind it is that if you love someone, in time fate will bring you together, again. Overall Score: 5 Stars (i.e. I will be adding this to my DVD collection)

Spout Post: Puzzling But Satisfying

Sun, 25 Jun 2006 05:44:00 GMT

Post By: pippin06
Post To: Reel Thoughts
Post Date: 6/25/2006 1:44:00 AM
Body: See the Fantasy group for the most details. Considering the thought I'm putting into it, I sure am glad there is a happy ending to this movie. But I'm still confused. Why does this magic thing even start working? I feel like major plot points were neglected and left too much to the viewers' interpretation. The film is based on a book; I wonder if the book explained everything? The rating: I'm giving it a 7 out of 10. The overall work of the film is shaky (it's confusing, it's disjointed, it's vague, it leaves too much to the imagination) but I felt entertained/warm-hearted about the movie. It's better than a 6 (cute) because of the satisfying ending and the fact that the film was not cheesy, but I can't quite give it an 8 because I'm still trying to understand the story; I couldn't suspend my disbelief long enough to forget that in no way was this romance explained or this magical mailbox explained. It's kind of creepy, too, if you think about it, getting random letters from someone in the past. I blame this lacking ability on the screenwriter though. I really believe the book wasn't adapted well. The test: will she be buying it? The answer: I would say the jury's out. I think I definitely need to watch it again before I make any hard and fast decisions. Sandra and Keanu have chemistry, and the sentiment is a beautiful one, but I just can't bring myself to accept the scenario that the film tries to sell. Who knows? Maybe I'll catch something I missed the first time around on a repeat viewing and think that the film is the greatest... Without another viewing first, though, I probably won't buy it.

Spout Post: THE LAKE HOUSE - THOUGHTS UPON VIEWING (NO SPOILERS)

Sun, 25 Jun 2006 05:42:26 GMT

Post By: pippin06
Post To: The Imagination of Fantasy
Post Date: 6/25/2006 1:42:26 AM
Body: The word of mouth/buzz around this movie was that it was good - yes, even though Keanu is in it. So, friends and I went to see it. Hey, he did a fine job. I think he has the ability to act, despite what some people think; he just doesn't use it as often as one would like. That's not why I'm posting, though. I was undecided as to whether this could truly be called a fantasy, but, after having seen it, I would say it's most definitely fantasy and a puzzling one at that. I'm still thinking about it, which is a good sign. I just don't know what it is I think, and that's not such a good sign. The basic plot is that Sandra Bullock's character, Kate, moves from a lake house that apparently Keanu Reeve's character (whose name I don't remember) lived in two years previously, and, magically, they are able to communicate across this two year divide when Keanu finds a letter that Sandra left for the new tenant/owner. Except SB wrote it in 2006 while he finds it in 2004. This house, further, was built by KR's father, played by Christopher Plummer, and there's all of these weird interconnections, but they continue to write letters to one another and play around with time and consequences, eventually fall in love, and so on. Ultimately, this is a romance and a predictable one at that. It's a fantasy, though, because it involves a sort of magical realism (good for the Selkie group too) - somehow, and it's not explained how, these two star-crossed lovers are able to communicate across a two year divide though this house. Plus, they have the same dog, who magically appears and disappears. Maybe you're supposed to think the dog is magical? Maybe you're supposed to think that fate intervenes (regarding the ending)? I'm not quite sure. The ending itself is a bit of a head trip. The fantasy aspect, obviously, stems from this inexplicable ability to communicate into the past or the future and derive love from this. Obviously, I am extremely puzzled because I want to know how and why this letter writing thing starts, how it's able to be pulled off. I feel like I missed a crucial plot point that would have explained that; there's a lot of talk about the characters' backgrounds, but the tie-in is very non-apparent. I don't know. I got wrapped up in it emotionally and began to wonder "what if?" Yet, the whole concept is annoying in the sense that it doesn't make sense. What's so special about this house? Unless, I'm not making sense. I will say that the movie feels like a cross between Sleepless in Seattle and Somewhere in Time. The friends I went with said it was very reminiscent of Frequency, too, though I never saw that movie. Has anyone else seen this movie. What do you think?

Spout Tag:love

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 01:28:29 GMT

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Number of times used: 14

Spout Tag:waste

Wed, 15 Jul 2009 13:04:09 GMT

waste
Number of films tagged: 41

Number of people who tagged: 9

Number of times used: 10

Spout Tag:keanu

Fri, 20 Feb 2009 20:09:03 GMT

keanu
Number of films tagged: 7

Number of people who tagged: 8

Number of times used: 10