The Lake House

Looks like this is Get To Know Chicago Month at the movies. Two weeks ago in The Break-Up, Vince Vaughn took a busload of tourists on a sightseeing trip through the Windy City, and now, in The Lake House, Keanu Reeves plays an architect who shows some of the city's more unique buildings to Sandra Bullock. But in the latter film, there's just one catch: they do not visit these buildings at the same time. It's pretty much impossible for them to do so, because Reeves lives in 2004 and Bullock lives in 2006, and they have been exchanging letters back and forth in time through a sort of magical mailbox. So he leaves her a map and tells her which places to visit, and when she arrives at one, she finds a two-year-old message waiting for her in the graffiti. It's a good thing nobody cleaned that wall or posted any bills there!

Sandra Bullock stars as Dr. Kate Forster, who's reluctant to give up her rental home on the lake

The time-bending premise might remind viewers of Frequency (2000), in which a father and son communicated across the decades through a ham radio. But The Lake House is actually a remake of a Korean film which came out at about the same time, known in these parts as Il Mare. The new version was written by David Auburn, the award-winning Proof playwright, and directed by Alejandro Agresti, an Argentinian making his first English-language feature. And while it has some interesting ideas and some nice mood moments, it never quite comes together.

This is partly because the filmmakers don't seem to know quite how to flesh these characters out. Bullock plays Kate Forster, a doctor who has recently finished her residency and is too busy with work, work, work to even think about having a social life, let alone a love life. She gets along well enough with her colleague, Anna (Shohreh Aghdashloo), and she has a mother (Willeke van Ammelrooy), too, but their conversations aren't very revealing; even with these two women in her life, the filmmakers have to resort to making Kate a fan of Jane Austen books and Cary Grant movies to give her a sense of dimension. As Alex Wyler, the eldest son in a dysfunctional family of architects, Reeves has a little more to do, but he looks and acts so different from his dad (Christopher Plummer) and younger brother (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) that they never seem like more than a trio of actors.

Keanu Reeves as Alex Wyler, who finds a very different lake house waiting for him

And then there is all that time-bending stuff itself. If the story had been told from only one character's perspective, it would have been trippy enough. But the story is told from both points of view simultaneously—and the opening scenes even trick you into thinking that Alex's part of the story takes place after Kate's, instead of vice versa—so you could spend most of the film just trying to sort things out (who knows how much about who and when, and so on). Don't get me wrong, I like time-travel stories and all the paradoxes thereof, but keeping track of these characters, it is a tad difficult to get lost in the moment the way you should during a romance.

Thankfully, there is a scene in which the jumping back and forth in time is put on hold, and the film basks in a single, luxurious, romantic moment. Kate does not have a boyfriend in 2006, but she did in 2004, and Alex bumps into him shortly before he is about to put on a surprise birthday party for her. The boyfriend (Dylan Walsh)—one of those dull sticks that exists in these movies for the sole purpose of being dumped by the female protagonist—invites Alex to the party, and Alex, eager to meet Kate in the flesh, introduces himself to her outside on the porch. Agresti allows the scene to unfold slowly, patiently, using just a few long, uninterrupted shots—and while Reeves' talents as an actor may be somewhat limited, he and Bullock do have a certain chemistry (remember 1994's Speed?), and it is fun to see them "meet" like this. And even though we know how the scene will end (not least because the Kate of the future has no recollection of meeting Alex), we are still curious to see how it gets there.

But scenes like this do raise other problems. It is understandable that Alex, as he begins to fall in love with Kate, would want to track her down and see what she is up to in 2004, even though she has never heard of him yet. But Kate doesn't express any interest in tracking Alex down to see what has become of him in 2006, even though he would obviously remember her. For that matter, while Alex does ask what the world is like in the future—but without getting into specifics, like who won the presidential election—he never expresses any curiosity in his own future. In a world where people Google each other before their first date, this seems unlikely.

The Lake House also falls into that trap that afflicts so many time-travel stories, in which the filmmakers cannot decide if the future is already fated, and the characters are just living through the experience, or if the future—and therefore the past-is open to revision. Frequency got around this by openly embracing revisionism, but The Lake House seems to want a sense of tragic inevitability, all the better for jerking tears out of the audience; however, the film can't quite commit to this, and so there are isolated scenes in which actions in the past produce spontaneous changes in the future. And it all leads to an ending that is just riddled with holes.

When Alex and Kate meet at the lake house, anything could happen

The film's narrative problems are compounded by Agresti's laid-back direction, which may work for the porch scene at the party mentioned above, but all too often just leaves scenes sitting there, without grabbing the audience or taking us any deeper into the lives of the characters. Several scenes end abruptly, or they just fade away. Put this uncertain style together with the complications of sending messages through time, and the film seems both overworked and undercooked. Oh, and did I mention the somewhat clunky plot mechanics involving a super-intelligent dog who bridges the two timelines? The titular house by the lake sure is pretty, though.

Talk About It

1. What would your first question be if you met someone from the future? Would you want to know about the world? Yourself? Are there some things we should not know about the future?
   
   
2. What does this film say about the future—is it fixed, or is it flexible? Are certain lovers "meant to be," or is it always a matter of choice? Note also how, when Kate asks why her mother didn't stick with a certain boyfriend in her younger days, her mother replies that it was so she could have Kate. Are our births "meant to be"?
   
   
3. Is it possible to love someone you have never met? How? Can you get to know someone through an exchange of letters? Through e-mails? If we live in our bodies, as incarnational beings, how important is physical proximity?
   
   
4. What do you make of Alex's actions at Kate's birthday party? Is it okay that he tried to kiss Kate, because he knows that she will not be with her boyfriend any more in the near future? Is there a sense in which relationships transcend time?

The Family Corner

The Lake House is rated PG for some language (a four-letter word or two, Christ's name taken in vain a couple times) and "a disturbing image"—probably the one of the traffic accident that leaves a victim lying in the street.

Photos © Copyright Warner Brothers

Copyright © 2006 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

What Other Critics Are Saying

from Film Forum, 06/22/06
The last time Keanu Reeves played a time traveler, it was 1989, his name was Bill, and his partner in trouble-making was a dude named Ted. The last time he got romantic with Sandra Bullock, he was a cop on a bomb-rigged bus.

Now, Reeves is time-traveling and courting Bullock in The Lake House, a remake of a Korean film called Siworae (also known as Il Mare).

The film, directed by Alejandro Agresti, isn't quite up to code, according to Christian press film critics. John Cusack, who was reportedly invited to star in the film, turned it down, and it sounds like that might have been a wise move. The film features supporting work by Christopher Plummer (The New World) and Shoreh Aghdashloo (who will play Elizabeth in The Nativity Story).

Christa Banister (Crosswalk) acknowledges its "intriguing premise, a talented cast" and "picturesque scenery." But then she notes that "the story plods along at a painfully slow pace without even a hint of that romantic spark we're supposed to be all excited about between the lead characters. And if that wasn't bad enough, there's not much of a central plot either as the story segues from a love story to a family melodrama to a clichéd commentary on how too much emphasis on one's career leads to a lonely existence where you're forced to play chess with your dog on your day off like Kate does."

Harry Forbes (Catholic News Service) calls it "an intriguing if slow-moving time-warp love affair that is, at the very least, quite unusual in its concept. … In its theme of love transcending time, the film resembles such cinematic fantasies as A Portrait of Jennie, Somewhere in Time and Kate and Leopold." He points out that there are "plenty of head-scratching loopholes so you need to apply a major suspension of disbelief."

Bob Smithouser (Plugged In) says it's "a sweet time-warp story that, despite asking audiences to suspend a certain amount of disbelief, adheres pretty well to its own internal logic. I could've done without the profanity, but Argentinean director Alejandro Agresti does a marvelous job of avoiding other offensive content that a dyed-in-the-wool Hollywood insider might've thrown in just to get a PG-13. Agresti's visual style is equally impressive. … More than anything, it's wonderful to watch as the main characters grow to love each other based on friendly conversation, not physical attraction or some personal agenda."

The film's found a few fans among mainstream critics … but only a few.