They are left alone with their lovely, renovated Vermont home and a set of enigmatic new neighbors to match. More like Claire's left with them, as Norman frequently abandons her to further obsess over his work as an award winning geneticist. With little now to occupy her mind, Claire starts to see and hear strange noises and visions in the house, visions that start to mess with her mind and, eventually, with her marriage. This is the type of movie whose plot truly cannot be described, for sake of saving suspense. No wonder I couldn't make it past page 25 in the script - the film pushes on at a drawn out, languid pace.
Nothing happens in the first hour, folks - nothing.
A few gratuitous scares, small pieces of background, but the first hour merely has an odd, slow, piecemeal energy to it. And it does. Pfeiffer, as Claire, is the dramatic center of the story, who does an excellent job showing a woman's well-rooted insecurities and fears grow by degrees into neurotic insanity. Ford is often left as a reactor to Pfeiffer's hysterics, but takes on a distinctive personality of his own by the second half. The production values are top notch, with the light designer getting mad props for a beautiful job in setting light levels using everything from handheld candles to fog rising off the lake.