Not Recommended. So many of these adapted foreign thrillers start out with a real scary premise and presence, but end up with weak stupid endings that don’t make sense. Dark Water is one of those, along with The Ring, and The Grudge. Anyway, Great slow build up of this single mother and her child trying to make it by moving into an old dilapidated apartment complex, while the mom works through her relationship with her divorced husband. So the dark water that starts to drip into the apartment and spread in stains on the ceiling is a metaphor for unfinished business that also turns out to be a supernatural thriller with a naturalized explanation. The whole thing is Jennifer Connelly, the mom, uncovering a child death that is the result of negligence, but then in a stupid ending, she has to allow herself to be killed to be the dead girl’s mommy for eternity in order to save her real daughter from being killed. What the..? Jennifer was neglected and the girl who died was accidentally abandoned, so Jennifer is supposedly redeeming herself by saving her daughter and taking up an abandoned daugher ghost. But she abandons her own daughter to do it! It fits logically, but not emotionally or psychologically. It just wasn’t satisfying. Great spooky build up and great thriller metaphor, but unsatisfying ending and moral. Excellent quirky character parts by John Reilly, Eric Roth and Pete Postlethwaite.
