When it comes to Hollywood, Harrison Ford is one of the most iconic and prolific actors. His career has spanned decades and is marked by a long list of commercially and critically successful performances across genres, and so it’s surprising that the horror genre is notably absent from his filmography. In fact, Ford has only appeared in two horror movies throughout his career, the 1977 made-for-TV supernatural horror movie The Possessed and a 2000s Hitchcockian thriller that is now streaming on Netflix.
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That movie is What Lies Beneath, and it’s available to watch on Netflix as of December 1st. Robert Zemeckis’ 2000 supernatural horror thriller film stars Ford opposite Michelle Pfeiffer as married couple Dr. Norman Spencer and Claire Spencer. When Claire begins to suspect that their lakeside home is haunted by a female ghost, their marriage is thrown into disarray as she unravels the truth about her husband.
What Lies Beneath Marked a Change of Pace for Harrison Ford
From Han Solo in Star Wars to the titular Indiana Jones in the iconic action-adventure franchise, Ford is known for playing the good guy, but What Lies Beneath required the actor to step into a more sinister role, and he did it convincingly well. Ford’s portrayal of Norman relied on deception, the actor masterfully playing the part of a doting husband with subtle clues to his true nature of underlying narcissism and entitlement that make it easy for the audience to overlook the warning signs. His performance builds much of the movie’s suspense and leads to a major payoff when the truth about his character is revealed, Ford fully committing to the villainous nature in the iconic and terrifying bathtub scene.
Ford’s character in What Lies Beneath subverted audience expectations of his typical hero roles, and the actor told Empire of taking on the role of Norman that “there comes a point when you’ve exhausted your opportunities playing good guys.” The actor added that he “saw there was an opportunity to play a character different from what the audience’s expectation was. A chance to take their crude experience of me — of my iconography, if you will — and turn it on its ear at an appropriate juncture in the film to be useful to the process of telling the story.”
Ford’s performance in What Lies Beneath, which played perfectly against Pfeiffer’s performance, made a strong case for Ford as a villain, proving the full range of his acting abilities. The movie as a whole is terribly underrated, Zemeckis crafting a film that constantly builds tension leading into a shocking and unexpected twist. The film is definitely one to revisit now that it’s on Netflix.
What’s New on Netflix?
What Lies Beneath is one of several new titles streaming on Netflix. The streamer’s December newsletter has already brought titles like A League of Their Own, Downton Abbey, Pulp Fiction, and The Wolf of Wall Street to the platform. Later this month, Netflix will start streaming Forrest Gump (December 4th), Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery (December 12th), and The Talented Mr. Ripley (December 13th).
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