Housebound (2000) User Reviews

agoraphobic chick rents out room to totally hot stranger.. and confusion results..

[a-koan · 5/10 · 3 October 2005]

i am totally in two minds about this film.. i dunno where to start..

i *think* i enjoyed it.. but it's hard to tell..

the film started out as a tense thriller, with lots of strange noises behind closed doors & mysterious meat products.. then without warning i was watching a sweet romance, which was actually good enough for me to *forget* what the movie had started out as.. i was aching to be held in sarsgaard's arms myself ! then BOOYAH ! it's a thriller again.. only.. which could've almost worked, if the film didn't close with what *seemed* to be the suggestion that sarsgaard was a cross-dresser.. and then the predictable 'is he or isn't he' ( a killer, not a cross-dresser ) ending..

and all the dates were messing me up.. i couldn't tell if it was important to note them or if it was just a really bad way of showing the passing of time..

at the end of the day, housebound kinda feels like a really bad student film with a few really good moments.. but you're left feeling like you liked it anyway.. maybe.. or maybe it's just sarsgaard's eyes that're pulling me in..

*shrug*

either way, you should watch it just so you can tell me what the hell was going on : |

too much like a made for Lifetime movie for my tastes

[movieman_kev · 3/10 · 26 September 2008]

An agoraphobic woman, a victim of a violent rape, suspects that her new male roommate who loves to cook is up to something a tad more sinister (But not before getting romantically involved with him). This film is 1 part thriller to 2 parts romantic drama, not really that good of a ratio in my eyes, but the film is well-acted enough (even if it borders on the melodramatic at times) and there's some tension to be had. Perhaps not a great movie, maybe nor a good one, but it's perfectly suited for a rainy weeknight with nothing better to do. It plays too much like a made for Lifetime movie for my tastes though.

My Grade: C-

Horror light, very light

[ansell-72879 · 5/10 · 17 December 2020]

Well, here is an interesting little film. In a nutshell Marie, played by Katharina Wressnig, is a rape victim and an agoraphobic living in a house bequeathed to he by her father. She takes in a boarder, Tom, played by Peter Aarsgaad. Their developing relationship takes place against the background of a series of local murders.

There seems plenty of meat on this shank but 2/3s of the movie is lightish chatter and the final third, gets down to business but not enough time is left to really do anything with. The film is ostensibly about whom the killer might or might not be but is in fact about the developing relationship between Tom and Marie.

Taylor Swift, who pens a nice lyric wrote, 'I think the perfection of love is that it's not perfect'. This really is what Housebound is about, genuine love, but flawed love. The rape looms large and the filthiness this type assault is powerfully conveyed. The agoraphobia has grown out of the rape. Tom addresses the rape by gently leading Marie through the anxiety of agoraphobia.

This evolving relationship happens against the background the murders but these are far distant in the background only taking their proper place quite late in the movie.

Mari Kornhauser is both director and writer of this small independent production. She has a lot of experience writing but I think that this is first her attempt at directing. It shows.

A small point, the film's title, it might be known as Housebound or Kitchen Privileges depending the breeze direction.

I would watch it again but for a horror movie it makes quite a fine chick flick.

Somewhat entertaining, but mostly perplexing

[MBunge · 5/10 · 17 May 2010]

Every so often you run into a movie that leaves you at a lost for words. Kitchen Privileges is one of those films. It's weirdly simmering mixture of two-thirds Harlequin romance, one-sixth psychological thriller and one-sixth serial killer tale leaves me unsure what to think of this thing.

Marie (Katharina Wressnig) is a woman trapped in her house by agoraphobia since she was raped in an elevator. Neither her lover nor her friends have been able to do anything to help her. The only comfort she finds is in the company of Tom (Peter Sarsgaard), the sleepy-eyed young man renting a room in her house. Tom is handsome and caring and always knows what to say. He also might be murdering people and bringing pieces of them back to Marie's home to cook up in the kitchen. But when Marie's sister Mignon (Angeline Ball) disappears, Marie has to wonder if Tom is really a murderer...or is it all in her mind?

For a story about a emotionally fragile woman trapped in her home with what might be a cannibalistic butcher, there's astonishingly little tension generated for the first three-fourths of this film. In addition to Tom seeming to be half asleep all the time, the movie just sort of unrolls the relationship between him and Marie like an old comfortable sleeping bag. Aside from obviously expository stories in the media about a killer being loose in the area, these two people meet and get close like any other middling romance flick you've ever seen. Then the story goes from 0 to 100 MPH in about 5.8 seconds and throws a bunch of gothically overwrought stuff in your face before leaving you with an ending that makes you wonder if you understood what Kitchen Privileges was all about.

The acting is sufficient in most regards. Katharina Wressnig looks suitably vulnerable and Peter Sarsgaard skillfully walks the razor thin line between charming and creepy. None of the supporting characters do much more than advance the plot, but they do it effectively. There really aren't a lot of big acting moments to be had in this film, outside of a jarringly melodramatic sequence that's so odd it's hard to concentrate on the performances.

The direction is solid but it eschews, deliberately or not, so many of the basic styles and tempos of a suspense movie that it doesn't really create the undertone of menace and suspicion that I think writer/director Mari Kornhauser is going for. She simultaneously treats the serial killer aspect of the story too blatantly and too subtly. She's trying to blend them together, but the romance overwhelms the terror in the movie, even though the romance is fairly restrained as well.

Kitchen Privileges is a quiet film that tries and succeeds at being different. If something different is what you want, you'll enjoy it. More conventionally, though, it's never bad but it's never really good. It's like it should be better than what it is and you can never quite put your finger on why it isn't. As a movie, it's more intriguing than entertaining…which is still something, given that many films are more crap than entertaining.

Nice movie, good tension and build-up

[eflemieux · 9/10 · 8 August 2001]

I have had the occasion of seeing this movie at the 2000 Montreal Film Festival. Minor spoilers ahead.

This movie is midway between a classic thriller and an "atmosphere" movie. A young woman (Marie) struck with traumatic agoraphobia lives as a virtual shut-in in her house. She rents a room to a mysterious stranger who displays a suspicious behavior... especially around the kitchen. We can feel the tension build up as the main character feels more and more suspicious and scared of her new boarder. The film is esthetically pleasing, with very sophisticated visual transitions between the different time periods depicted, while successfully delivering the required level of tension and atmosphere. Katharina Wressnig, as Marie, delivers a great performance as a quite-normal acting, yet deeply perturbated, woman. Peter Saarsgard, as Tom, succeeds in creating a friendly-looking boarder while displaying just enough mystery to raise and sustain our suspicions. I will give you a buffalo nickel if you can correctly guess the ending ten minutes before the movie ends. This independent production compares very well with major studio releases of the past few years. It will not be a hit with the hemoglobin addicted "Scream" fans but it will appeal to audiences looking for a well driven story and more sophisticated visual values.