Secret Obsession focuses on Jennifer Williams, played by Brenda Song, a woman who is struck by a car while fleeing a pursuer and wakes up in the hospital with short term memory loss. A man claiming to be her husband Russell, played by Mike Vogel, helps her regain her memories, showing her photos of her old life, and explaining to her how he’s essentially the only one she speaks to. As a detective, played by Dennis Haysbert, investigates the events of Jennifer’s accident, Jennifer begins having flashes of the night of the accident, and both she and the detective begin to get increasingly suspicious of Russell.
For a movie called Secret Obsession, there’s really no secret to this movie. It’s obvious from even just looking at the poster that Russell is not who he says he is, and is some sinister individual who holds the obsession in question. And because of that, this movie is just a ticking time bomb right from the start, essentially just anticipating the moment when he’s going to reveal himself. There’s really no surprise as to what this movie’s twist is.
And even if one were to have avoided seeing even one piece of promotional material for this, it’s still painstakingly right out in the open from just the dialogue. The screenplay doesn’t even feel like it’s first draft-worthy, from some of its horrendous dialogue and lack of attention to detail. This guy’s attempts at trying to cover his tracks feel like way too clean cut for anyone to believe him. He gives such convenient excuses such as how she quit her job - though never telling her what her job was or why she quit - and telling her that she stopped talking to her friends, though giving no explanation behind that either.
Yet she blindly eats it all up, despite the lack of any details, and never bothers to ask any questions asking for more. This movie has a severe lack of characterization, with characters essentially serving as objects who have some terrible gaps in logic just to make this contrived plot work. There is especially one painful scene in which Russell kills someone right out in the open in a residential neighborhood, and sets off a car alarm in the process. The neighbor who owns the car somehow fails to see him, has no clue why their car is going off and simply goes back inside after shouting “who’s there” for five seconds, rather than actually leaving their front step. The movie does what it can to stretch the plot out even further than it needs to.
And there’s nothing that’s ever actually learned about any of these people that makes them remotely interesting, even when the film’s not-so-subtle twist is revealed. Jennifer is only characterized by the fact that she got into this accident. There’s literally nothing else unique about her. Her personality prior to the accident is never revealed, while barely any information about what her life was like is explored. There’s really only one vague piece of information that’s used to serve as the whole motivation behind why Russell was doing what he was doing, and it borrows from essentially every other Fatal Attraction-style of obsessive stalker movie.
Meanwhile, Dennis Haysbert’s detective character is probably the closest thing this movie gets to having any even remotely interesting character, and that’s mainly due to the fact that he’s the only one who gives a committed performance in this film. Nearly all the acting in this movie is horrendous, and it would be hard to buy any of these characters as fully functioning human beings from their total lack of emotion or overly-simple dialogue. Haysbert is the only one who gives a committed performance, which is a shame, given how his character is also reduced to a cliche in his own right, this being the “obsessed, workaholic cop who will do whatever it takes to solve the crime” trope.
And if all of this wasn’t infuriating enough, the icing on the cake is the musical score. This movie overall has the look and feel like a Lifetime movie, and it couldn't be any more obvious than its musical choice. There’s essentially only one tune played throughout this movie, and it’s an extremely cheesy, overly sentimental piano track that plays over and over again from beginning to end. It’s used in scenes that are meant to be laid back, and it’s also used in some scenes that are meant to be really serious.
After the first few minutes of the movie and one comes to the realization this tune is never going to go away, it gets progressively more and more aggravating to hear. The movie rarely changes it up in an attempt to build suspense or convey any other sort of emotion. It just keeps going back to this one incessant score that begs the audience for sympathy, but instead only encourages them to throw something in anger.
To say Secret Obsession doesn’t even try would be an understatement. This movie fails at everything it sets out to do. It doesn’t build believable characters. It fails to build any suspense. It lacks nearly and and all emotion. It doesn’t gain the audience’s attention, but instead angers them through some truly horrible music. And most importantly, it doesn’t even attempt to hide its big secret, making it so painfully obvious something’s wrong almost immediately. If it wasn’t for one decent performance, this would easily be the worst of the year. And while it’s not, it’s certainly down there.
Recommendation: Kill It With Fire
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