TNMC
This site’s design is only visible in a graphical browser that supports web standards, but its content is accessible to any browser or Internet device.
Lack of Disturbance
"Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Lester Livermore here with my look at the script for the thriller Domestic Disturbance. The script is by Lewis Colick (October Sky) and is dated July 2000. Harold Becker (Mercury Rising) will direct the picture. It stars John Travolta and Vince Vaughn.
Okay, enough with the details lets get onto talking about the script. It was a quick read that I buzzed through in far less time than the movie itself should take. The story is set in a small coastal town in northern California. Frank Morrison (Travolta) runs his own business building sailboats. He is divorced from his wife Susan. She has custody of their eleven year old son Danny. Susan is engaged to Kurt (Vaughn), a young man recently arrived in town with a big wad of cash. He's been plenty generous with it around town and subsequently they all love him. Everybody that is except Frank. He's worried sick that his son will fall for the new guy too and forget about ol' dad.
Now Danny isn't taking any of this too well. He got into trouble with the law when his parents split up and again when Kurt entered the picture. Now Kurt and Susan are engaged and, you guessed it, Danny has to be picked up at the police station. We've got a distinct pattern going here. More on that later.
Obviously this isn't the ideal family dynamic but none the less, things seem to start to settle down. Frank tries to be decent to Kurt, Danny tries to be decent to Kurt and Kurt tries to be decent back. One little problem. Kurt isn't who he says he is. Just who he really is doesn't become clear for some time but it's obvious everything isn't kosher when an unsavory type by the name of Ray Cole (Steve Buscemi) crashes the wedding looking for Kurt.
Suddenly Kurt isn't the nice guy anymore as he tries to quietly make this problem go away. Unfortunately, Danny sees Kurt making the problem go away and freaks out. He runs to his dad and accuses his step-father of murder. This sets up a truly awkward situation. Danny must live in the same house with a killer except nobody believes him. Remember the pattern of trouble with the law? Well everybody chalks Danny's story up to that pattern and thinks he's lying.
That's enough of the story. I don't want to give everything away. The whole time I was reading the script I couldn't shake the feeling that I had seen all of it before. Each scene seemed to remind me of another movie. Movies like Double Jeopardy, Sleeping With the Enemy and Ransom kept coming to mind. Then I found out that Kurt was played by Vince Vaughn and I was instantly reminded of Vaughn's character from Clay Pigeons. Basically what I'm saying is that this script isn't long on originality. The ending is completely standard and could be seen coming from about the beginning of the second act. Actually I could guess at it just from the title but that's not really fair to the script.
The script is listed as the second draft and I hope that means it was revised at least one more time because there are some glaring plot holes that really popped me out of the story. For instance, when a man is stabbed with an ice pick in a truck and then driven to a different location, do you think it's odd he doesn't spill any blood? Me too. Do you think that the police would decline to press charges against a guy who smashed one of their cars? Me either. These are points that are pretty damn important to the story but are just glossed over. It makes it very hard to follow the rest of the story with your belief intact.
I hope the script does get some needed attention because the basic premise is good. I just hate to see a good idea left unexplored in favor of the same old standard themes we've seen countless times before."
(Review by 'Lester Livermore'.)
Stay tuned...
That's all folks...
Jean-François Allaire (aka DeadPool)
Questions, comments, praise etc. Email me at deadpool@tnmc.org
Jean-François Allaire is TNMC's first columnist. At only 24 years old he has become a respected entertainment journalist, with his columns appearing in Corona's Coming Attractions and Scr(i)pt magazine. He also writes a monthly column in Screenwriters Monthly entitled 'The Last Word.' Hailing from Montreal this young writer is determined to dig up all the details on the movies before they hit your local theater. If you're part of a movie production then you really need to be talking to him.
