cold creek manor why did dale kill his family

Next week, a look back at Oliver Stones Nixon. As the stakes rise, Cooper insists that the rest of the family return to the city for their own safety. Cold Creek Manor is a 2003 American thriller film directed by Mike Figgis, and starring Dennis Quaid, Sharon Stone, Stephen Dorff, Juliette Lewis, Kristen Stewart and Christopher Plummer. Dale slaps Ruby violently, then punches men who come to her aid before Sheriff Ferguson draws her pistol. Music(Inappropriate) We later see that saying on a sign in a bar. Wanting to simplify their lives, the Tilsons decide to buy a recently repossessed mansion out in the country. Everything he does is after a look at the script, so that he appears, disappears, threatens, seems nice, looms, fades, pushes, doesn't push, all so that we in the audience can be frightened or, in my case, amused. Realizing he needs to figure out what happened at the manor, Cooper goes to interview Dale's father (CHRISTOPHER PLUMMER), who's in a nursing home, but all he gets out of him is something about the Devil's Throat. He then tells Cooper that he should buy the next round for everyone there as a gesture of good will. I was hoping for a fright, and on this rewatching of the film, I found myself losing interest in the movie. Cooper drives home while a bit intoxicated shortly after drinking many shots of liquor. Some brief, sexually related dialogue is present, as is a brief and partially obscured sexual encounter (with movement and related sounds). All Rights Reserved, Extreme Cold Creek Manor is a 2003 thriller film directed by Mike Figgis. We see a photo of a teenager giving "the finger." Heavy He smokes a joint, uses strong profanity, smokes, has sex with Ruby and turns homicidal. Cooper agrees and we then see him and others drinking. ALCOHOL OR DRUG USE A sudden sound might startle some viewers. The movie of course issues two small children to the Tilsons, so that their little screams can pipe up on cue, as when the beloved horse is found in the pool. The screenplay by Richard Jefferies tells the story of a family terrorized by the former owner of the rural estate they bought in foreclosure. We see several shots of Dale, sweaty and shirtless with his jeans riding down to expose the top of his underwear. Thank you for signing up to CinemaBlend. VIOLENCE He grew up in Cold Creek Manor, with an abusive dad. Why didn't he proceed to push down the husband? JULIETTE LEWIS plays his white trash girlfriend who has sex with him, uses strong profanity, is drunk, and briefly smokes. Plot points are so easily predictable it isnt funny: Coopers daughter Kristin (played by Kristin Stewart) gets a horse, so something must happen to that horse and it does. His girlfriend, Ruby (JULIETTE LEWIS), tells Cooper to watch his back, but her sister, Sheriff Ferguson (DANA ESKELSON), doesn't initially seem able or willing to help. In the end it is revealed that Dale Massie killed his family and buried them down the "Devil's Throat" and he was coming back to claim his property. About 50 profanities or obscenities, including f-words (17), s-words, exclamatory uses of Gods name and several harsh misuses of Jesus name. Dale is suspected of having murdered his own family in similar fashion. He is a psychopath who threatened to kill the Tilson family who moved to Dale's old home. [10], The film opened in 2,035 theaters in the United States on September 19, 2003, and grossed $8,190,574 in its opening weekend, ranking #5 at the box office, behind Underworld, Secondhand Lions, The Fighting Temptations and Once Upon a Time in Mexico. Belonging to the same genre as Pacific Heights, Fatal Attraction, Cape Fear and The Hand That Rocks the Cradle, this methodical, occasionally eerie thriller taps into our innate desire to protect family and home from a psychotic outsider with an axe (in this case, killing hammer) to grind. Rated R Cooper cuts off a poisonous snake's head (with brief and slightly bloody results). The husband was trying to get better cell reception, so he wasn't near the well when his wife was shoved in. Moderate He is a psychopath who threatened to kill the Tilson family who moved to Dale's old home. All Rights Reserved, Topics ToTalk About An extreme amount of suspenseful and ominous music plays in the film. A photo shows a bare-breasted young woman while an older woman is seen in her panties. IIRC the family believes it's the father precisely because his headlights/front of the car is smashed. Turning it into their dream house soon becomes a living nightmare when the previous owner (Dorff) shows up, and a series of terrifying incidents lead them on a spine-tingling search for clues to the estate's dark and lurid past Leah Tilson (Sharon Stone) gets out of bed on a busy morning in New York City at 4:30am. He only stops when the sheriff aims her gun at him. [1], Buena Vista Home Entertainment released the film on Region 1 DVD on March 2, 2004. Cooper and his family slowly make their way through the dilapidated house that still has the belongings of the former residents in it (although everything's in disarray). Instead of finding a safer place, they buy Cold Creek Manor, an old beaten manor that they intend to turn into their dream home. There is not one moment on screen that says to me that Dale is trustworthy. She has never got enough credit for her talent, and I think she is the perfect match to Quaid. Wanting to escape city life for the saner, safer countryside, New Yorkers Cooper Tilson (Dennis Quaid), his wife Leah (Golden Globe winner Sharon Stone), and their two children move into a dilapidated old mansion still filled with the possessions of the previous family. Cooper keeps poking around, gets a sense he doesn't trust Dale. Dale lights up a joint. They then meet the former owner, Dale Massie (STEPHEN DORFF), who states he just got out of prison and would like to work for them restoring the house back to its once prominent state. It is in anamorphic widescreen format with audio tracks in English and French, and subtitles in Spanish. PROFANITY We learn that a person killed his family sometime in the past and then see him kill his father. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available from thestaff@tvtropes.org. However, dont go out of your way to check in at Cold Creek Manor. Leah hears her kids screaming near the pool and races there to discover a snake in it (that Dale has captured and it isn't poisonous). Dale then sits next to Cooper and similarly orders several shots of liquor, resulting in Cooper being a bit inebriated. Dale puffs away in nearly every scene. If you are going to edit a lot, then make yourself a user and login. Taking a break from his multiple-perspective digicam experiments, helmer Mike Figgis displays at best a half-hearted interest in delivering the commercial genre goods, while Dennis Quaid and Sharon Stone fish in vain to find any angles to play in their dimension-free characters". He said the film "belongs to the Cape Fear tradition of thrillers in which the mettle of a civilized family man is tested in a life-or-death struggle with crude macho evil". Quaid plays the part well, and Stephen Dorff is great as the slimy Dale, but Dale Massie is a walking red flag to run away from. We see the point of view of someone approaching Cooper. IIRC the family believes it's the father precisely because his headlights/front of the car is smashed. The actors are talented, but they dont have much to work with. Cooper's phone line suddenly goes dead. Veronica Guerin (Special Edition) Cate Blanchett. Its great to see an average husband and wifewith a little help from the kidsteaming up to thwart a home-wrecker. He talks about Dales cigarettes, that they had intended him to be European, rolling his own cigarettes, but that preview audiences mistook his hand rolled cigs for joints (as did I) so he clarifies that they are tobacco, just so everybody knows that. They befriend local tavern owners Ray and Ellen Pinski and their daughter . Ruby, who appears to be drunk, then joins him and orders several rounds of shots for the two of them. Dale, recently released from prison, initially appears to be a good, kind worker. Miscellaneous people drink in a bar where the owner offers to buy Cooper a drink. CAST AS ROLE MODELS: Heavy Leah hears her kids screaming near the pool and races there to discover a snake in it (that Dale has captured and it isn't poisonous). [Spoiler Warning] We eventually see physical evidence of this crime in the form of decomposed bodies that had been thrown into a deep well called The Devils Throat. Cooper is convinced that Dale is responsible, acting out of spite. Rooms look beaten up, filled with the relics of the previous family, and then they are clean and neat and redone, while other rooms still have walls that barely hold the room together. Cooper and his family sneak onto and then into the estate before they put an offer on it (meaning they're trespassing). Cooper Tilson and his family decide to relocate from the big city to a small town away from the hustle and bustle of the metropolis existence. Dealing with bullies and/or the psychotic. He also suffocates his bedridden father. Several people smoke cigarettes. Leah tells Cooper that her boss asked her to sleep with him. He talks about the rules of the genre, pacing, music, editing, etc. RYAN WILSON plays her younger brother who somewhat becomes obsessed with a dark poem written by the boy who lived in the house before him. I remember whenCold Creek Manorcame out to the theatres, I was excited. Yeah, you might not get a good look at Stephen Dorffs cut frame, but your brain will thank you for it in the long run. Cooper also witnesses Dale strike his girlfriend Ruby in a crowded bar. Also, what was exactly the train of thought for the family to believe the father killed the horse? Dale comments on Leah saying that he could have "f*cked" her anytime he asked. "Do you know what you're getting yourselves into?" Synopsis Leah Tilson (Sharon Stone) gets out of bed on a busy morning in New York City at 4:30am. Violence consists of several deaths (from smothering, a fall and unknown means), while attempts on others' lives also occurs. It holds a 12% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 111 reviews, with an average rating of 3.8/10. DANA ESKELSON plays Ruby's sister, the local sheriff who drags her feet in taking action against Dale and uses some strong profanity. None of the good deleted scenes are worse then anything else in the movie, but they arent much better either. They then try to get away from the intruder through the dark house. Dale goes to Devils Throat and punctures Cooper's truck tires. . After Cooper asks what she did, she says she said yes, but that an emergency phone call prevented that from happening. She uses some profanity and states that she agreed to sleep with her boss to get a promotion (but that never happened). I don't think someone could fly out from NYC and come help him within that timeframe. WILL KIDS WANT TO SEE IT? To learn the details of the manor's past, Cooper visit's Dale's aging, demented father who lives in a nearby nursing home. MUSIC (INAPPROPRIATE) Dale goes after Cooper and Leah, and Cooper kills Dale by shattering the skylight on the roof of the house and Dale falls to his death. window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; Cooper hears someone in his house, thinks he sees someone approaching on the other side of some hanging plastic, and punches that person (but it turns out to be Leah). The Tilsons are a loving family that must work through normal conflicts, as well as unite to overcome extraordinary ones. Moderate She smokes a lot, always an ominous sign, and is ambiguous about Dale -- she loves the lug, but gee, does he always have to be pounding on her? Every part he has, Plummer makes it exciting, and whether he has a few scenes or the whole movie, I am captivated by his performance. We see a rear view of Leah in her small panties as she gets out of bed. JumpScenes The intruder then tries to hit Cooper who blocks those attacks with a ladder. (2003) (Dennis Quaid, Sharon Stone) (R) (Note: The "Our Take" review of this title examines the film's artistic merits and does not take into account any of the possibly objectionable material listed below). Sharon Stone is a great actress and does well with the part of Leah, but she isnt given much to stand out, and ends up playing a stereotypical role that keeps Stone from excelling. So he convinces the Tilsons to hire him as a handyman. The audience has to undergo an extended scene in which Cooper is not pushed down the well, in order for everyone to hurry back to the house, climb up to the roof, fall off, etc. He killed his wife and two children because they were going to leave him. Cooper secretly tapes Dale's father in a nursing home (to use in a documentary). Its a hustle-bustle life, the pressures of which reach a crescendo when a near-miss in heavy traffic endangers one of the children. SUMMARY: In COLD CREEK MANOR, a family thinks they're getting away from New York City and entering a quiet haven in their new mansion in the boonies, but when the creepy former homeowner shows up and strange things start happening, the family must quickly figure out some long . His father expected his son to have had the Manor in his possesion, but when he looses the house to the government due to short payments, it becomes abandoned and the Tilson family moves in. COLD CREEK MANOR is a heart-pounding thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat in tension-filled suspense. Remember the abstract passing of time I mentioned before? Starring: Dennis Quaid, Christopher Plummer, Sharon Stone, Kristen Stewart, Juliette Lewis, Stephen Dorff, Dana Eskelson, Ryan Wilson. The former owner, Dale, offers to help them fix the place up, but resents Cooper's interest in his family history. Ruby wears a midriff-revealing top. Cooper shatters the skylight, sending Dale to his death. scuba diving, Touchstone and Beyond: A History of Disneys "Fright Night", Touchstone and Beyond: A History of Disneys "Alive", Universal Studios Florida's Tribute Store Tells Original, Milk Creek Entertainment Inks New Home Entertainment, Touchstone and Beyond: A History of Disneys Cold Creek Manor, New Episodes Every Wednesday House of Mouse Headlines Presented by Laughing Place. We then see a shot of them (through a window with blinds that obscure much of what we're seeing) having sex, with movement and related sounds. Which is illogical once you start thinking about it. We see an old drawing/picture of a man holding a knife to a child. Ruby tells her sister, the sheriff, that she fell (instead of admitting that Dale punched her). After Cooper asks what she did, she says she said yes, but that an emergency phone call prevented that from happening. One then hits the third several times with a pick-like device, eventually causing the skylight to break and the third person to fall through it, another skylight and then hard to the floor below (where he's presumably dead). Director Mike Figgis (who in the past brought us Leaving Las Vegas and the brilliant film Timecode) really should have his camera taken away from him. We see bloody water in the swimming pool and then see an underwater shot looking up from the bottom to reveal the silhouetted shape of a dead pony floating on the surface. We see a photo of a boy holding a rifle. Dale's father says that Dale is the "corrupt spawn of your whoring mother" and then says that Dale's kids probably weren't even his, that he couldn't even make babies. After a chase, Dale corners Cooper and Leah atop the roof, and openly declares his intent to kill them and dump their bodies down the Devil's Throat like he did to his family. Documentary filmmaker Cooper Tilson (Dennis Quaid) and his professionally. With the locals becoming suspicious of them and Dale becoming increasingly unstable, Cooper and his family try to uncover the mystery regarding him and his former home before it's too late. Design and text 1996 - 2023 Jon Sandys. The script grafts from every possible thriller most of which had pilfered their predecessors and loads on implausibilities until we wonder why the actors play it seriously". ImitativeBehavior Here's a brief summary of the content found in this R-rated thriller. We see several tools on a wall, and Dale says that they're killing hammers with spikes in them, used to kill farm animals (some viewers might not like the thought of that). Dale shows up at the trailer of his trashy girlfriend, Ruby, and begins undressing her. Quaid starred in a similar film in 2019 called. Cooper cuts off a poisonous snake's head (with brief and slightly bloody results). QUICK TAKE: Kill.Switch (2003) Resident Evil 5 (2009) Grand Theft Auto III (2001) "Cold Creek Manor," starring Sharon Stone and Dennis Quaid, is true to all the worn-out clichs as it depicts the tale of a family being terrorized by a madman. One character briefly smokes a joint. Also, the cast is solid. Two people clothesline a third with a rope that they then use to tie him down to a skylight. Where the hell did the killer go after pushing the wife down the well? If you are bored and have nothing else to do, why not. But COLD CREEK MANOR is definitely not a horror film. This is Thesecret1070. 2023's Most Anticipated Sequels, Prequels, and Spin-offs. Plot After their young son is nearly run over in the street, Cooper and Leah Tilson decide to give up high-flying careers in New York City and move to the countryside. We are shown a new weapon, so something must happen with that weapon and it does. Cooper secretly tapes Dale's father in a nursing home (to use in a documentary). Or what? Miscellaneous people drink in a bar where the owner offers to buy Cooper a drink. As they begin to make it their own, a series of events begin to occur that makes them believe that the former inhabitants are not yet gone. Trailer (2003) When documentary filmmaker Cooper Tilson and his wife Leah decide life in New York City has become unbearable, they and their children Kristen and Jesse move into a decaying mansion filled with the possessions of the previous family. We see some small photos of a teenager showing her bare breasts. An intruder breaks through a door to get onto the roof. Cooper hears someone in his house, thinks he sees someone approaching on the other side of some hanging plastic, and punches that person (but it turns out to be Leah). Cooper isn't happy about that and leaves for a while. The movie is an anthology of cliches, not neglecting both the Talking Killer, who talks when he should be at work, and the reliable climax where both the villain and his victims go to a great deal of inconvenience to climb to a high place so that one of them can fall off. MUSIC (SCARY/TENSE) Kristen finds a piece of wood with the word "evil" on it and is then surprised by her brother. gtag('config', 'G-6VYSQ581R3'); A documentary filmmaker, Cooper is intrigued by the history of the house, particularly since the foreclosure on it left all of its belongings - albeit in disarray - still there and ready for examination. Cinemablend is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Sheriff Ferguson is dedicated to keeping the peace, and becomes a refuge for the Tilsons when Dale turns the rest of the town against them. Accordingly, he turns from friendly and helpful to increasingly volatile and dangerous. Hes an actor that brings so much passion and energy to the screen that despite all the failings of a movie, Quaid can make a character shine. They find a sprawling run down large old house in the boonies of a small town. "COLD CREEK MANOR" Should you still be concerned about the film's appropriateness for yourself or anyone else in your home, you may want to look more closely at our detailed listings for more specific information regarding the film's content. I just hope its the kind of movie families will actually be able to watch. At first it seems like everything is good. Dale belches after eating. In "Under the Tuscan Sun," another new movie, Diane Lane is able to find some cheerful Polish workers to rehab her Tuscan villa, but the Tilsons have the extraordinarily bad judgment to hire the former owner of the house, Dale Massie (Stephen Dorff), an ex-con with a missing family. He only stops when the sheriff aims her gun at him. 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