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By Joel Frady
If Fatal Attraction was a well-oiled machine that sold incredibly
well, Obsessed is the product you would
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expect to see on the market a year later. It's the same design,
but the new architect could only read the blueprint and put
the pieces together in the "correct" order, but couldn't
begin to tell you why they go in that order or what it is that
each part is supposed to do.
Such is the problem with Obsessed, which feels like someone
made a boring, stupid version of Fatal Attraction, a film that
many would argue was stupid and boring enough on its own. It's
got a similar plot - happily married man meets a knock-out at
work who quickly becomes a little too fascinated with him. But
while Fatal Attraction was a story with moral implications and
a nutty stalker in Glenn Close, Obsessed is just a slow-moving
story with a more-hot-than-creepy Ali Larter (Heroes).
Not to be hard on Larter, because no one else is any better.
Idris Elba (28 Weeks Later) is boring as Derek, the aforementioned
happily married man who meets Lisa (Larter) after she is assigned
to his office through a temp agency. He is married to Sharon
(Beyonce Knowles), who is barely seen for the first 75 minutes.
His "best friend" at work is Ben (Jerry O'Connell,
Tomcats), a guy who appears to think that Derek is his best
friend but never notices that Derek usually ignores all of his
generic, dude-friend dialogue. There's also the police woman
investigating the case (Christine Lahti) who is smart enough
to see everything clearly from the moment she appears and probably
belonged in a smarter movie.
None of these characters are particularly interesting, and neither
is Obsessed. It takes a long time to build - 20 to 30 minutes
too long - and provides a quick, lackluster battle toward the
end. Knowles provides a couple good moments down the stretch
once the movie stops ignoring her, including the film's only
good scene, but it's not nearly enough to make up for all the
useless, boring scenes that precede them.
Obsessed is so boring, in fact, that I had a fonder memory of
seeing the name Earvin "Magic" Johnson as one of the
film's executive producers than I did of most of the movie.
I wondered if it was the same Magic Johnson that battled so
furiously with Larry Bird until Derek said he dreams of owning
the Lakers. And after seeing Johnson's product fall so flat
here, I'm wondering if Bird could make a better movie (The Hand
that Rocks the Celtics?).
As a thriller, Obsessed has no thrills: there's no moral dilemma
to conflict the viewer, and Lisa isn't violent or crazy enough
to be scary.
As a drama, there's very little character development, and most
of these characters seem to devolve into impatient, angry people
instead of learning a lesson and maybe even maturing a little.
In short, there's just no reason to care, much less care enough
to worry, about what happens to any of these people - and when
you just don't care, 100 minutes can feel like an eternity.
Obsessed is playing at the Regal Cinema 7 in Boone.
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