Watching "What Lies Beneath" again, as I suppose, for a Halloween treat.
This, like Super 8, was one of those movies that I came away disappointed from during my initial screening... but then continued to grow on me with repeated viewings and now I really like it.
I think Zemeckis managed to pull off the "slow burn" in terms of the supernatural elements of this movie; he takes his time, as if he's not afraid of losing the audience, and so the movie slowly develops more and more sense of dread that eventually becomes unbearable, so you're just WAITING to see whether the ghost is real. And it allows him to take a mere "reveal" shot that usually is the BEGINNING of most "ghost stories" and use it as the climax of the film, to frightening effect.... a real, subtly building, non-sensational use of the "revenant" motif. "Haunting" is a great word for the ending. A director has to be confident in his material and presentation to take his time like this and not rush.
Really nice performance by Michele Pfieffer as well, as the woman who ends up investigating this deepening mystery of a girl's disappearance and never quite being sure whether she is receiving communication from beyond the grave or simply going mad. The scene where she channels Madeleine is very creepy, and then she manages to shift gears completely when the tone changes. She's done some excellent work in her career even if she doesn't seem to do much nowadays, and always had an "otherworldly" feel about her. Also, we get to see Miranda Otto in a supporting role BEFORE she became famous for playing Eowyn in the LotR trilogy... and Diana Scarwid takes a kind of throwaway "best friend" role and turns into a quirky, flitty extrovert performance that still has a core and sticks in my head years later.