THE LAKE HOUSE (2006) - Alex Wyler
Like I said in my last post, let's see if we can't crank through the last 14 years of Keanu movies as fast as possible. I know I've got some great ones coming up, some not so great ones, and even a handful of movies I've never even heard of.
At the start of this project, I was actually a little excited to get to a few of these later ones I'd never seen before and that actually includes the 2006 movie, "The Lake House." I'd heard a little bit about it before, I know it's a time travel move, and I know it's a love story and hey, I like some time travel movies (notably "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure") but also some other ones like "Terminator" and "Looper," and I even like some romance movies, including "The Last of the Mohicans," which is a perfectly spectacular movie. So what if my romances require a scalping or two?
The problem with a lot of time travel movies is that they make no sense and "The Lake House" is certainly no exception. In fact, if I were to sit here and try to decipher exactly what is and is not happening in this movie in regards to time my brain might explode, so I'm going to do my best to avoid it, which might be difficult since "time travel" is sort of at the center of this movie.
As always, complete spoilers ahead while I attempt to explain this movie, which really isn't that complicated, but again, makes *no* sense.
Sometime in 2004 or 2005, someone apparently got the bright idea to reunite our hero Keanu Reeves with his on-screen counterpart from "Speed" but instead of putting them on a bus together for 90 minutes, they decided to separate them in time for two years, because sure, why not? I imagine the pitch for this was something like "what if we redid You've got Mail but with a time traveling mailbox?"
The movie opens with Kate (Sandra Bullock) moving into her rented house on the lake, which for the record is made completely out of glass. You know what they say about people who live in glass houses? They can't take dumps in private. But that's really okay because if you look at this house you might notice the absence of one important feature: a bathroom.
Just do your business in the woods.
We then cut to Keanu Reeves as Alex the architect, also moving into the same house (we learn later it was built by his father the architect), except it looks a little bit unused and rundown. He checks the mailbox and gets a letter, which we hear in voice over from Sandra Bullock, and you better get used to voice over in this thing because it's used a lot.
The letter basically makes no sense to Keanu as it says something about forwarding her mail and apologizing for the "paw prints at the entrance and in the attic." This makes no sense to Keanu as he doesn't see these footprints anywhere, but a scene or two later a dog shows up out of nowhere and gets muddy footprints all over the walkway and in the attic.
Two quick asides here - first, do you see that picture above? Do you see a fucking attic anywhere? No? Me neither. So I guess this glass house also has an invisible attic which we see Keanu crawling around in at various points. Second, skipping ahead a bit to where we figure out that these two people are separated by exactly two years, did Keanu never bother to wash away the muddy footprints in two years? Did it never rain?
Okay back to where I was -
In the present, Kate has moved from the lake house to Chicago where she works as a doctor at a very busy hospital. One day while eating lunch, she witnesses a man get hit by a bus and he dies while she's trying to resuscitate him. Skipping way ahead once again, we later find out it was actually Keanu Reeves who was hit by the bus while on the way to meet her (I guess he was so excited to meet her after magic letter correspondence for years that he forgets to look both ways or just WAIT FOR THE FUCKING LIGHT) and despite the fact that they had in fact met prior to this accident, Kate apparently has no recollection of this and doesn't realize it's Keanu that's dead.
Like I said above, this movie makes no sense.
Anyway, the two of them start writing letters back and forth (lots and lots of voice over) and they eventually realize that somehow they are living exactly two years apart from one another. This is all done through the magic mailbox in front of the house, for which we never really learn the rules of. Does the mailbox only work with letters? Can they send packages? What happens if Keanu sticks his dick in the mailbox?
For some reason, neither one of them seems to be, you know, awed by the fact that one of them is communicating with one person in the future and the other the past and they essentially begin a pen pal relationship where they fall in love with each other because....well I'm not entirely sure why. Keanu tells her that he's an architect and she tells him that she's a doctor and this is basically all either of them need to fall in love. Sure.
This isn't even to mention that ostensibly, every time Kate needs to write back to Keanu she has to drive 45 minutes outside of the city to drop off a letter, I mean, what a pain in the ass! Like, Sandy, you're pretty hot and you're a doctor, maybe find a nice guy that lives in the city and I don't know, is on the same literal timeline as you.
If you're reading this letter, it's not too late to pass on this movie
As for Keanu, rather than trying to start a relationship with a woman who lives two years in the future from you, I don't know, use the ability to know the future for personal gains. Keanu apparently begins a life of celibacy as he's trying to "catch up" to Sandra Bullock even though it's literally impossible. If I were him, I would have asked her for some stock tips or find out the endings to sporting events. Hell, because she's two years in the future, he could just start leaving cash in the mailbox for her when he places gigantic bets on basketball games or continuously wins the lottery. How is it that only Biff Tannen was able to figure this out? "Hardball" Keanu Reeves would have been all over this shit!
Seriously Keanu, pull your head out of your ass
We eventually learn that Kate has a boyfriend in Keanu's timeline, a very nice man named Morgan who is head over heels in love with Kate, but for whom she is mostly "meh" about. One day, Keanu's adopted dog gives chase and he ends up at Morgan's house where it dawns on him that he's Kate's boyfriend. Morgan, apparently the nicest man in the universe, invites Keanu to a party that very night despite the fact that they literally just met. Keanu eagerly accepts as he knows that Kate will be there as this is the woman that he's talking to two years in the future even if she doesn't know that yet.
So when Keanu shows up to the party, he's aware that he's been talking to the 2006 version of her but she's naturally clueless. Outside the party, they dance and share a kiss and they're caught by Morgan who is just a bit stunned that his girlfriend is making out with this stranger that he invited to the party. He doesn't even seem that mad about it! Does any of this make sense? No? Great.
Thanks for coming to my surprise party and all but uh, who are you again?
Back in 2006, Kate realizes that she's actually met the guy she's been exchanging time traveling letters with yet it makes no sense how she hadn't figured this out before. Like, you don't remember the guy you made out with at your surprise party that led to the end of your relationship with Morgan? Fuck this movie makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.
They continue their time traveling correspondence for a while and agree to meet on a specific date in 2006. Keanu makes a reservation at this fancy restaurant, but when Kate shows up to meet him there, she ends up getting stood up, which they both think is a little weird. Keanu claims that he must have gotten called into an important meeting or something but you'd think he'd drop everything to make this appointment in the future given everything that's already happened. It doesn't dawn on either of them that he could be dead but that's just fine because this movie has already hoped that anyone watching it has lost their sense of reason by now.
A dog learning how to play chess would make more sense plot-wise than this movie
By the way, you'd think Keanu wouldn't be standing ANYONE up for a date anyway, given his treatment by Diane Keaton in the previously reviewed piece of shit movie, "Something's Gotta Give."
At this point, Kate basically calls off their relationship as it is never going to work (you think?) and she decides to get back together with Morgan, moving in with him in Chicago. Amazingly nice lawyer man that lives in the present > impossible dream man who lives two years before you.
Morgan, being the amazing guy he is, buys them a house in Chicago but it's a bit of a fixer upper so they hire an architecture firm run by Keanu's brother to redo the place. At the firm, Kate sees a drawing of the lake house, made previously by Keanu and she learns that this is Keanu's brother and when she asks about him she learns that he's dead - once again shocking that she didn't recognize him as he was presumably dying in her arms.
Have I mentioned that this movie makes NO FUCKING SENSE?
So she rushes off to drop a letter back in the mailbox basically saying, "hey don't come meet me because you're going to get hit by a bus and die," saving his life.
Later, at the lake house (I'm honestly not even sure which timeline this is at this point nor do I care), Keanu and Kate meet (even though they already met once at the birthday party) and share a very awkward kiss. It's been a while since I listened to this episode of "How Did This Get Made," but I'm fairly certain they spent about 15 minutes just talking about this:
The end.
I have to admit, while this movie barely made a lick of sense, I did not hate it. Maybe at this point I've become desensitized to some really bad movies due to this project, but when I start thinking back on some of what I've watched already, I'd much rather be forced to watch this again than say, "Tune in Tomorrow," "The Matrix Revolutions," or a litany of others.
Some scattered thoughts:
*Wow, I just wrote 500 or more words about "The Lake House," and didn't even touch on the subplot involving Keanu and his world famous architect father, played by Christopher Plummer. I guess that goes to show how much of an impact it made on me. That said, there is a scene where dad has a heart attack (and ends up in Kate's hospital), but is declared to be doing just fine. That is, until Keanu shows up with a coffee for him, and dad takes a turn for the worse and dies. Was the caffeinated coffee the cause of his death? I don't know but I sure hope so.
*At one point after her shift at the hospital, Kate goes to the bar and her doctor friend shows up and declares that it's against social norms to drink alone after 10 PM. First of all, I've never heard that and second of all if that's the case then I'm in a lot of trouble, particularly as we all continue to live through COVID19.
Yeah, maybe don't start trying to booze-shame me, I'm trying to have a relationship with a man from two years ago
*This is the second recent movie after "Something's Gotta Give" where the lead female protagonist really treats their boyfriend pretty shittily. I won't rehash Diane Keaton's abysmal treatment of Keanu in that other movie, you can reread that post here if you want, but Sandra Bullock is pretty awful to Morgan in this one, leading him on for YEARS before eventually dumping him to go live in a lake house with no bathroom.
Oh Morgan, you poor bastard
*Seriously, who invites a literal stranger to a surprise birthday party for their girlfriend? Of course, rather than be like "who the hell is this stranger at my party?" Sandy takes this opportunity to makeout with him, causing the first breakup with Morgan.
*I've heard for a long time that the movie "Primer" is a completely confusing and complicated time travel movie. To anyone that has seen that movie and understands it, perhaps you can give me a call and explain "The Lake House" to me.
*The female dog in this movie owned both by Keanu and Kate is named "Jack," an apparent inside joke because that's Keanu's name in "Speed." I'm yet to meet any woman ever named Jack. Why not Jackie, or I don't know, Annie (Bullock's name in that movie)?
Box Office Information: $52 Million Domestic ($73 Million inflation adjusted)/$63 Million international for $114 Million worldwide on a budget of $40 Million. That is frankly absurd.
Rotten Tomatoes: 35% Critic/73% audience, once again proving the fact that audiences are very stupid.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
My Movie Rating: 4.5/10. Like I said, I didn't completely hate this. When I finally wrap up this project (hopefully in about a month or two) I plan on writing a long and drawn out post with all of my rankings combined along with some awards and scattered thoughts. As such, the rating system is going to come down to movies I'd rather watch as compared to others which means there might need to be a few changes and tie-breakers and I would be ashamed of myself if "The Lake House" wasn't above at least a few dozen stinkers I've already watched and will probably be watching in the future.
Keanu Rating: 4/10. He's pretty bland in this and it doesn't help that he's forced to interact with his love interest via letters and voiceover. There's also this sneeze:
Up Next: "Street Kings." I have no idea what this is.
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