Netflix’s Dangerous Lies – A Dangerously Bad Thriller

Dangerous Lies follows the story of a waitress named Katie Franklin (Mendes) who loses her job and manages to become the caretaker for Leonard (Gould), a wealthy elderly man. As they grow close, he passes away, leaving his estate to Katie and her husband Adam (Usher). While the young couple settles into their new home, Leonard’s past starts to catch up to him, sweeping Katie and Adam up into a confusing web of lies and murder.

From the first fade in, Dangerous Lies instantly sets the same tone as Mendes’ most recognizable part of her filmography, the television series Riverdale. The color schemes, or lack thereof, the diner and the situation inside all scream Riverdale inside and out. As the film moves forward, the comparisons slowly shift from Riverdale to Knives Out as Katie goes from a waitress at a pop-up diner to a caretaker for an older man. The final shift occurs once the story starts to imbue similar thematic elements to Martin Lawrence’s Blue Streak. As a result, these narrative shifts unfortunately make for a questionable, lacklustre narrative that borrows heavily from other content that feels like a set of small parodied vignettes poorly sewn together.

The film also pushes hard on the marital issues equal secretive husband trope, but unlike Netflix’s other recent mystery thriller Secret Obsession, this time Dangerous Lies flips the script after an entire film of actions to try to seem fresh. Again, this just does not work given its attempt at layering a complex plot of threads to follow that all of that falls flat. From the early departure of the film’s best character in Gould’s Leonard to the laughable plot points that are supposed to seem plausible, The film dangerously rides a fine line of secrets and stupidity.

Apart from Gould’s performance, the rest of the cast is pretty average given the bland characters and writing. The latter is particularly disappointing, especially the glacial pacing as the narrative stretches out its short story out long enough to be passed off as a feature film.  In fact, the only real positive within Dangerous Lies was its cinematography and camera work, but despite this, a few scenes still felt a bit off. In the end, everything about the film seemed par for the course as far as Netflix thrillers are concerned, average and generic.

Also yes, the director’s real name is Michael Scott.

*still courtesy of Netflix*

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Dylan Phillips