Review: Secret Obsession

Russell (Mike Vogel), Jennifer (Brenda Song) Photo from Polygon

*This review contains SPOILERS*

Um, wow.

I just watched this Netflix film, Secret Obsession and I have to say that I wasn't really impressed.

But I will get to that later. The movie stars Brenda Song (Suite Life of Zack and Cody) and Mike Vogel (The Brave) as the leads and along for the ride is Dennis Haysbert (24, Major League) as Detective Page.

As the film opens Jennifer is running for her life and ends up at what is to be a gas station and of course, no one is there to aid her from the hooded man with the wicked knife in his hand. She manages to run into the bathroom. (Why is the bathroom or closet the choice of hiding places in these kinds of movies, I do not know.) She escapes after makes it back to her car.

At this point, this guy is like Jason Voorhees who appears for a scare as she tries to start her car. Guess what the car isn't going anywhere because he has now somehow darted past her and got back into his truck and is attempting to pull her car out of the mud. (What? Why? Why not just drag her ass out of her car and put her in the truck?)

Jennifer then gets out of the car and flees into the road and gets hit by a car and is rendered unconscious.

She is taken to the hospital where they work on her and memories of her life play as she goes into her unconscious state. Soon her husband runs into the hospital looking for his wife. With no identification shown he runs towards the O.R. (So, no one is gonna ask this man how he got there so fast, especially when no one called him?)

To no one's surprise, Jennifer wakes up and has no memory of her husband. (Of course, she does.) Russell helps her get better and then she is released from the hospital. Russell takes Jennifer to this beautiful house, which is out in the boonies and has no cell service (of course it doesn't).

At some point, Jennifer has flashes of memories of her wedding to Russell, but she realizes that something feels off.

I don't want to give too much away but I would say this that this movie could have been a bit better. The acting wasn't really the problem. I think Vogel's Russell brought just the right level of creepy that almost makes you wonder maybe he's not really a bad guy. However, he really is.

The scene when they were about to make love and suddenly Jennifer has a flash and changes her mind. Russell goes from 0-100 when Jennifer refuses his advances, saying "I've been helping you get better. I'm your husband and you gonna do this to me after all I have done for you?!" All the way grabbing hold of her arm. Brenda Song almost looks legit scared of him as she turns away and goes to sleep.

Dennis Haysbert's Detective Page...he is slowly putting the pieces together about Russell/Ryan's true identity. Why would he go alone and not call for back up once he realized that this man is dangerous? And true to form, he finds Jennifer. He attempts to rescue her but gets stopped by Russell. This movie definitely likes to hit people in the head with rocks or some kind of object. (Jennifer hits Russell in the head with a vase, and a tree branch. Russell hits her in the head with a rock. He also hits Page in the head with a rock. He hits the guy who goes to report him to Page with a tire iron.)

Jennifer escapes the house on foot. She is injured and is trying desperately to get cell service. Ultimately, she gets in a fight with Russell to which he almost shoots her. Page intercepts and like traditional suspense, the gun falls as the two men struggle to gain the upper hand over each other.

A confused Jennifer who really delays on picking up the gun shoots Russell. But because Russell apparently goes to the Jason Voorhees school of  'No bullets can stop me,' takes the hit and advances on her. She shoots again missing him and then a third time, dropping Jason, I mean, Russell for good.

Sigh, this movie...I really can't understand movies like this. They made Jennifer so weak. As many times she tried to escape, she always got caught due to a fall or leaving evidence behind that shows that she left the room without Russell's permission.

If it was their intention of making her weak, they succeeded. I think Vogel's performance is award-worthy just for the fact that he truly brought a sense of creepiness to the character.

I wouldn't say that it's completely bad, so if you want to see it check it out. Let me know what you think.