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List Price: $9.98 | | Label: 20th Century Fox
Salesrank: 6694
Released: September 2, 2003 |
| Our Price: $4.77 |
| Used Price: $3.33 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Julia Roberts tries to escape an abusive husband by faking her death. But eventually her past catches up with her in this suspenseful and scary drama.
Description of Sleeping With the Enemy:
This 1991 thriller by Joseph Ruben (True Believer) works up to a point: Julia Roberts plays an abused wife who fakes her death and starts anew under a different identity in Iowa. Her psychopathic husband (Patrick Bergin) figures it out and stalks her and her new boyfriend (Kevin Anderson). The best part of the film is the moody isolation of Roberts's life with Bergin. Ruben ingeniously stakes out the story by presenting what looks like an ideal life between the two--a nice house on the ocean, a seemingly healthy sex life, etc.--and then, whammo! Vital to the plot but less interesting is everything afterward, but that's less an inherent script problem than it is obvious studio pressure to push Roberts as a cute star. There's even a sequence where the actress tries on a series of hats while Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl" plays on the soundtrack. Such insistent valentines to Roberts destroys most of Ruben's momentum and the film's credibility, and the project never quite recovers. --Tom Keogh
Sleeping With the Enemy Reviews:
It was great 
2009-11-18 - It was shipped on time and we watched the movie and everything was great with it. Thank you!!!
exciting thriller
2009-10-25 - Not only is Sleeping With the Enemy exciting to watch because of the suspenseful storyline, it actually IS a really good movie with top notch acting from everyone.
Not only that, but the film has dated really well because the picture quality still looks amazing. Dare I say, it actually looks better now compared to when the film was first released?
Julia Roberts isn't one of my favorite actresses, I admit, but she delivers a splendid performance here. Throughout the movie, you see Julia's character trying to start over her life by moving to a small town in Iowa because her previous husband abused her pretty hard.
In Iowa, she meets a man, falls in love, and believes her horrible, haunting memories of the past are completely behind her... but little does she know what's about to happen. Little does she know her ex-husband is still out there, and searching for her once he finds out she's still alive.
Sometimes the story goes through some slowdown time where no suspense or action takes place and instead focuses on Julia's love for her new boyfriend (with a few lengthy romantic bits included as well) but this is actually quite fine by me because it shows the viewer how willing Julia's character was to move on and leave the past behind her. It looks believable too. It makes you appreciate the suspense when it eventually does happen. The lengthy time at the end of the movie was a perfect example how to make a suspenseful storyline. Don't give too much away too early.
The acting is phenomenal all around, and the storytelling is quite good too. It's just really amazing how GOOD the movie looks after all these years. Job well done to the directors and camera crew who worked on the film.
"Julia Roberts Is Superb"
2009-07-15 - "Sleeping With The Enemy" delves into the life of a woman who is emotionally and physically battered by her husband. Julia Roberts is outstanding as the wife of a prominent business man who decides after too many hits she is finally going to leave. However, she knows walking out on her husband is not going to be enough as he will track her down and probably kill her, so she fakes her own death and leaves, then starts her new life over again in a new town. Then, as a shock to her and the audience the husband tracks her down!
Patrick Bergen is amazingly creepy in this film as the abusing husband. After watching "Sleeping With The Enemy" you will hate him, which is a testament to how a good an actor he is in this movie.
The DVD comes with the trailer and a featurette and the film comes in both full and widescreen versions with the disc being double layered. There is also a chapter search card that accompanies the DVD.
FIX THE STINKING TOWELS! 
2009-07-02 - After realizing her wealthy husband isn't quite the perfect man, Laura (Julia Roberts) is driven to desperation. Her husband Martin (Patrick Bergin) is a collector. He has a great car, an awesome job, a massively luxurious house on the beach, and Laura serves as a trophy wife. Unfortunately for Laura, however, Martin also happens to be psychotic, and he has one of the worst cases of OCD on the planet. He wants Laura to look a certain way, act a certain way, and most importantly, clean/organize the house to his liking. The canned food should have all labels facing outward, the bed must bounce a quarter, and the towels have to be even on the rack down to the thread; she's in a wife's version of Basic Training.
What to do? Laura plans her incognito aquatic escape aided by an altered appearance. Thanks to the YMCA, she disappears from Martin and reinvents herself Sara. Making her way to Iowa, she's scared on a daily basis by things like trains, whistles, aligned medicine cabinets, baseball diamonds in corn fields, and freshly creased sheets. When she meets a limp noodle drama professor named Ben Woodward (Kevin Anderson) - the anti-Martin - the demented love triangle is set for the "surprise" showdown.
The pacing is done fairly well, and the scares are believable. The character development is minimal, but it's just enough to build trust and support for Laura, pitting absolutely everyone against Martin (mostly because of his abuse, but partially because of his molestache). The concept reversal is tenuous at best, but it serves as a setup for Laura's freedom attained through her triumph over vulnerability - her new lease on life.
Director Joseph Ruben weaves a well-structured and paced film. At no point is there a lull without intensity, and conversely it is never overly ridiculous (despite moments of implausibility). I think that the messages within are as much about audience manipulation as they are abuse (considering that nobody feels bad about a blatant murder being crucial to the climax), but it's a solid suspense thriller sure to keep viewers on the edge of the seat...or at least until Julia calls the cops, "Hello, 911?"
GREAT MOVIE, BRILLIANT ACTRESS, COVER ART DISASTER
2009-05-23 - Can someone please tell me why studios have to $%#* up your favorite movies' cover art when they put them out on dvd? It was bad enough when the video for this movie came out on VHS, when they'd changed the orignal movie poster to a shot of Julia all spooked in the bathtub, but now this? The cover art of this dvd is about the most unflattering photo of Julia I've ever seen. I can only hope someone who can do something about this reads this, and restores "Sleeping With The Enemy's" original movie poster cover art when it's time to release this on Blu-ray.
