Main cast: Michelle Pfeiffer (Claire Spencer), Harrison Ford (Norman Spencer), Joe Morton (Dr Drayton), Diana Scarwid (Jody), James Remar (Warren Feur), and Miranda Otto (Mary Feur)
Director: Robert Zemeckis

Good news: What Lies Beneath can be pretty nerve-wracking at times. And Harrison Ford, shirt on, can rock my world still. Michelle Pfeiffer too is still a goddess on screen.

Bad news: As the movie goes into its second hour (it’s two hours plus in running time), it begins to morph from a standard thriller into some inane version of The Goonies (with higher budget for effects). And Harrison Ford takes his shirt off.

The story is pretty standard. Claire and Norman are two happy, lovey-dovey couple. When the kids go off to college, leaving Claire along and bored, she starts seeing things, like ghosts. Doors start slamming and opening by itself, and ghostly whispers and writings on window panes start appearing everywhere. Is Claire nuts or is she being haunted? Norman, a geneticist, thinks that it’s time she sees a shrink, while her best friend Jody thinks not. Something’s fishy about the whole thing…

And oh, did their neighbor Warren kill his wife Mary?

Well, there may be homages to mystery classics everywhere, but the movie is pretty so-so actually. The scares, while effective at first, start to drag after a while because the story doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. Boo, boo, boo, and more boos! Where’s the drama?

And Harrison Ford takes his shirt off. Spotty skin isn’t a pretty sight. Thank goodness the lighting isn’t that bright.

Sure, What Lies Beneath is pretty okay for a scary thriller. But it also drags and the script just doesn’t know what to do to fill up the long running time, except to make Ms Pfeiffer wet. And no, that’s not dirty, alas.