Deadly Illusions - Unsatisfying Psychological Thriller

During this weekend, there were not that many movies/series that I really looked forward to in various streaming platforms or cable TV. So I opted to watch this movie that was released on Thursday. The premise looked promising and the cast were quite well known to me. All right, I'll get started with it now.

Brief Story Line

Mary Morrison (Kristin Davis - Sex and the City TV series, Couples Retreat etc) was a best selling novel writer who was happily married with Tom (Dermot Mulroney - My Best Friend's Wedding, Insidious: Chapter 3 etc) and had twin children. When her publishers requested Mary to write a new novel, she hesitated as it would leave her children by themselves since she need to fully concentrate while writing. 

With the suggestion from her best friend Elaine (Shanola Hampton - Shameless TV series etc) to hire a caregiver from reputable firm, Mary finally get the one she felt immediate closeness, a young woman named Grace (Greer Grammer - Awkward TV series etc). Things seemed to be fine and good at first for Mary but when her imagination started to run wild, she began to doubt which was real and which was just illusion that could threaten her happy life.

So how would the story conclude? Find them all in this movie.

End of Brief Story Line

Yeah that was disappointing. At first I thought this would be like a suspenseful thriller with many surprising twists plus maybe a bit steamy like Fatal Attraction or The Babysitter (1995 version, not that fun 2017 Netflix movie). But this movie did not provide any thrills or suspense and the supposedly twist was neither surprising nor logical.

At first the story seemed OK with the introduction of the Morrison family, but it moved in a very slow pace that was a bit boring for my taste. I tried to be patient but not until half way through the movie that it started to have something interesting. At least the build up to the climax was not bad with a good enough way to reveal certain things. However the ending was disappointing and there was the very final scene which seemed to be done to confuse audience but unfortunately it just made me curse as there was no reason to do it at all.

The cast here did their job adequately with Kristin Davis tried her best to be this character, while Dermot Mulroney was pretty standard. Greer Grammer really suit the role of the sweet innocent Grace whereas Shanola Hampton was generally OK. There were no real stand out performance in this movie. Oh btw there were few love making scenes that were not the steamy type, which would explain why the film was not classified as erotic thriller (despite the trailer might have suggested otherwise).

I did not have anything against the writer & director of this movie Anna Elizabeth James whose prior works I have not seen, but I thought it could have been better by adding few scenes that would make us wonder during the middle part, or throwing out that very last scene or whatever. She did manage to write this herself as there was no mentioning of a book adaptation, so her creativity should at least be applauded. But anyway this was not the psychological thriller I was hoping to spend my time during the weekend.

So if you are OK with watching an almost 2 hours thriller that did not really deliver what the trailer promised, then you are welcome to do so. However, if you prefer a more enjoyable or critically acclaimed one, then this would not fit your wish. The choice is yours.

Mike's movie moments rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars