I was left waiting, and waiting... and waiting. "Where Sleepig Dogs Lie" is a sleepy, and cold-hearted psychological thriller with a lot converstational pieces and reflective posturing which doesn't go anywhere with it all. Dylan McDermott plays a struggling writer Bruce Simmons who moonlights as a real estate agent to earn some cash, yet he moves into the house he's meant to be selling after finding himself homeless. There he accidently uncovers the house's dark history - the previous tennants were brutally slaughtered by a murderer who was never caught. So there becomes the basis of his next novel... without realising what he's really getting into. Also a stranger (Tom Sizemore) arrives on the scene asking if he could rent out a room, and Bruce obliges. However in doing so, he might dig up a past best left alone.
So the premise had me hooked, just the execution left me lukewarm. The thing is, it was predictable and you could see the twists in the story coming. So you're just waiting for the thrills and spills to make up for its uneventul progression, but they never eventuate in spite of the dangerous predictament evolving. Which makes it rather boring because you're waiting for McDermott's character to figure it out and when he eventully does (takes him long enough) you'll think suspense would be at boiling point, yet its simply flatlines and rushes through its anticlimax.
It's disappointing, because I liked Sizemore's jittery performance. He grows particularly unnerving as film goes along, and it really does faulter when he isn't on screen becuase he is the most fascinating character. Forseeable traits, yet the chemistry between McDermott and Sizemore's characters is what the plot hangs off. Details upon details lead to uncomfortable and factured truths, and two minds are presumably after one end. Its just can you live with the consequences. And the final few minutes paint it perfectly. It's just the journey to that point was too straightforward that it lacked the ups and downs to keep me fully invested.
