Ever since the resounding box office success of “Just One More Time” and the mudslinging between the main actors Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, which was closely followed by the media, the name Colleen Hoover has become a household name even to those who neither regularly scroll through the depths of BookTok nor count romantic books among their reading material. With her low-threshold, accessible prose and her consistently conflict-driven emotional dramas, Hoover has long since established herself as a kind of unofficial successor to Nicholas Sparks (“The Shining of Silence”).
As a result, her books are not only literary bestsellers, but Hollywood also sees them as box office triumphs. The next Hoover adaptation is now starting with “Verity – Dark Secrets”. This time the material changes genre and presents itself as a dark, glossy thriller, but as is typical of the writer’s works, the adaptation by “When you saw me” director Michael Showalter constantly strives to dramatically escalate emotional states of emergency.
Verity (Anne Hathaway) and Jeremy (Josh Hartnett) may be a couple, but do they really know each other?
The young author Lowen Ashleigh (Dakota Johnson) receives an unusual offer from Jeremy Crawford (Josh Hartnett): she should finish the successful book series by his wife Verity Crawford (Anne Hathaway). Since a mysterious accident, the best-selling author is no longer able to do this. To prepare for work, Lowen moves to the family’s remote estate and begins combing through Verity’s notes and unpublished manuscripts. She discovers disturbing recordings that give a completely new picture of the writer and raise numerous questions about her past.
The more Lowen learns about Verity’s life, the harder it is for her to distinguish between truth and fiction. At the same time, she feels increasingly drawn to Jeremy, which means that the mysterious discoveries have an increasing influence on her own life. Lowen soon finds herself in a whirlpool of abysses, mistrust and contradictory truths, which forces her to question her previous ideas about the family and their situation.
There is nothing here by chance
Since the publication of Colleen Hoover’s novel “Verity” in 2018, there has been a persistent rumor on TikTok that the best-selling author did not write the book herself, but rather hired a ghostwriter; Sometimes there is even talk of brazen idea theft. One could almost think that Hoover himself came up with the speculations in order to give the already complex story about the fine art of twisting the truth an additional level – one on which fiction encroaches on reality.
One thing is certain: in “Verity” hardly anything is left to chance, even if not every twist in the plot is particularly difficult to guess. The fact that Jeremy comes into Lowen’s life as a real Rosenkavalier is by no means just fate. Of course, there is a dark secret behind the encounter. The almost provocative politeness of the man, portrayed in the usual charismatic manner by Josh Hartnett, suggests that this acquaintance is not a good one. This is unmistakably underlined when, shortly beforehand, a bicycle courier is hit by a car in the middle of New York and Lowen is covered in blood from head to toe. This splatter moment seems as drastic as it is strangely out of place – and at the same time sets the tone for the rest of the story.
Lowen (Dakota Johnson) is drawn more and more into an abysmal web in which nothing is as it seems.
Once the huge lakeside estate in snowy Vermont is established as the central setting, “Verity” finally reveals itself as a dark mystery thriller. Lowen not only has to dig through the disorganized notes and index cards that Verity left behind, but also increasingly penetrates the head of the megastar author, who is catatonic and confined to a wheelchair after a car accident – and comes across one shocking abyss after another.
“Verity” is definitely an atmospherically staged chamber play in a priceless, wood-panelled designer villa. Similar to the thriller hit “The Housemaid – If She Knew” with Sydney Sweeney, the film knows how to keep interest in the constantly shifting character dynamics. At the same time, you move in a world whose characters and settings clearly come from the realm of the screen fairy tale. That’s entirely legitimate: where events unfold so effortlessly, people won’t want to insist on ultimate plausibility anyway.
Really good Bavarian cuisine!
The problem is that director Michael Showalter and his screenwriter Nick Antosca rarely really dare to give free rein to the B-movie exuberance. Sure, every twist is celebrated with due anointing. And then there is a wonderfully absurd scene in which Jeremy and Lowen spend an evening in a Bavarian restaurant eating Wiener Schnitzel. When Josh Hartnett takes a big pull from the beer mug while the waitresses in dirndls bustle around in the background, a roar of laughter goes through the rows of the Berlin press presentation. More of this bizarre nonsense would have been needed.
The fact that “Verity” also has to have a sexual component seems to be built into the attractive triangular constellation from the outset. However, it is precisely here that the film begins to weaken most clearly – and touches on an old problem of Colleen Hoover: the romanticization of toxic relationships. In any case, apart from a glass of whiskey, why Lowen suddenly feels attracted to Jeremy remains a mystery. Here in particular, “Verity” could have played up the psychosexual dimension more and deepened the increasing fusion between Lowen and Verity, instead of contenting itself with immortalizing both women orgasming with teeth marks in the bed frame.
What is Verity really up to?
The fact that “Verity” still keeps you entertained throughout its somewhat excessive running time of 120 minutes is thanks to Hoover’s recipe for success. The pure pleasure in the abstruse condensation of emotions and conflicts, in its consistent over-construction, develops a fascinating pull – somewhere between a highly polished soap opera and a B-movie thriller, accompanied by mysteriously tinkling piano sounds.
Conclusion: “Verity – Dark Secrets” is a Colleen Hoover adaptation through and through: human depths are lined up in glossy images, feelings are unctuously displayed and a lot of hooks are hit. It’s fun thanks to the attractive and committed star trio, but it could have gone a step further in terms of theatrical B-movie enthusiasm.