Customer Reviews

Tim O'Brien's In the Lake of the Woods

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While Tim O'Brien has written several novels that could each be described as the definitive story of Vietnam, this movie, based on one of O'Brien's best novels, feels half-hearted at best. The adapted script, the direction, and acting all feel underwhelming. Kathleen Quinlan gives a fine performance, but Peter Strauss clearly fails to deal with material well above his capabilities. In better hands, with a bigger budget, and a longer development cycle, this could have been so much more.

Some side notes:
This may have appeared on Lifetime at some point, but it originally aired on Fox.
Mary Higgins Clark did NOT write the novel. I don't know why someone would tag this movie with her name.
The ending of the movie differs GREATLY from the novel's ending.
Apparently, there were several difficulties in bringing the novel to the screen - which is why the movie appeared two years after the novel's initial publication date - but my memory is too hazy to recall what they were.

I recently reread the book and recognized it as a movie I had seen only part of on LMN. I bought the movie on Amazon and felt it was fairly true to the book and enjoyed it. I also recommended it to my sisters and daughters to read and follow up with the movie.

Evidently a TV movie, but it's a little better than most of those. The tale is dark and ambiguous. The acting is just ok. I didn't read the novel, but the author's other one, "The Things They Carried," is well regarded. You could do worse.