Arlington Road (Film Review)

1999 Screen Gems
Directed by: Mark Pellington; Written by: Ehren Kruger
Starring: Jeff Bridges, Tim Robbins, Joan Cusack, Hope Davis, and Robert Gossett
MPAA Rating: R; Running Time: 117 Minutes
The Nicsperiment Score: 7/10

Michael Farraday is reeling from the recent passing of his FBI agent wife, Leah. Leah died in the line of duty, in a bungled confrontation with an innocent terrorist suspect. Michael spends his days teaching a history class that's devolved into him terrifying his students about terrorism, and his nights barely parenting his nine-year-old son, Grant, and then being comforted by his ex-grad student and current girlfriend, Brooke. One day, as Michael is driving through the neighborhood, he sees a badly burned boy stumbling through the street, picks him up, and rushes him to the hospital. Turns out the boy is the son of Michael's new neighbors, Oliver and Cheryl Lang, who now owe Michael a debt of gratitude. Michael soon finds that he and his family are spending a lot of time with the Langs...but something doesn't add up. Oliver might be a structural engineer, but the blueprints in his office don't seem to be for the building he's working on...and why is he always going on anti-government tirades...and what if "Oliver Lang" isn't actually his real name...
Arlington Road is a paranoia thriller about being paranoid. I think the filmmakers and actors are sincere about the film's "Fear Thy Neighbor" tagline, insistent that the most dangerous people on Earth are your white Christian suburban neighbors. However, a funny thing happened on the way to the theater: the film, either accidentally, or through some greater universal cinematic force, is one of the better "instead of fearing they neighbor, you should mind your own business" movies of the 90s. As Michael Farraday, the normally chill Jeff Bridges attacks the material like a rabid bulldog. This is a running, shouting, wild-eyed Bridges the likes of which hasn't been seen for decades. As the sinister Lang, Tim Robbins hams it up, sneaking in little leers, weird-line readings, and sieg heils wherever he can. Both actors are somehow simultaneously excellent and ridiculous. Meanwhile, Joan Cusack is quietly terrifying (maybe the sneaky best performance in the film) and Hope Davis is great as Arlington Road's voice of moral reason.
Director, Mark Pellington, dials so many things up to eleven here. He builds slowly after the facsimile of a NIN nails video opening sequence, but soon, everyone is noirishly underlit, backlit, Vertigo-shot, shadowed, silhouetted. It's wild. The late-90s paranoia atmosphere is as thick as immaculate smoke, curling through every window blind, and every shaft of old newspaper microfilm projector light. Ehren Kruger's script is emblematic of everything else here, enjoyable, then over-the-top, pushing all credibility, and yet still strangely satisfying in its nonsensical twist ending, as Angelo Badalamenti's score pulses dread. Some movies work in spite of themselves.