This one had promise, and in certain areas it delivers. That’s what makes the rest so frustrating.
Anne Hathaway is fantastic. She spends most of the movie in a wheelchair and is still the most unsettling thing on screen. Josh Hartnett is good too as the grieving husband and father, steady in a role that could easily have faded into the background.
Dakota Johnson is… Dakota Johnson. She’s a good actress, and I like her when a role is built for her. I just wish she landed in great films more often. This isn’t one, mostly because the script gives her so little to play.
The best parts are the glances. Hathaway’s character looks at Lowen for a split second, and then it’s gone. Did that really happen? You second-guess it right along with her. In those moments the tension grips, and the movie seems to know exactly what it’s doing. I wanted more. They pass so quickly that the pressure leaks out in between.
Then the ending hits, and fast. The finale is so abrupt. The twist is fun. I’ll give it that. But like so much here, it had real potential and never got the fine-tuning it needed.
The cast showed up, and those quiet, eerie moments prove the material had teeth but the script just never sharpened them.
Come for Hathaway if you must, but keep your expectations low. Verity is a great thriller buried under a weak script.
