Movie Review: Domestic Disturbance

Domestic Disturbance (2001) 

Directed by Harold Becker 

Written by Lewis Colick 

Starring John Travolta, Vince Vaughn, Teri Polo, Steve Buscemi 

Release Date November 2nd, 2001 

Published November 2nd, 2001 

John Travolta has a history of redeeming bad movies. Look at movies like Broken Arrow, The General's Daughter and Swordfish all bad movies made better by having Travolta as the star. Through the sheer force of charisma and charm, Travolta takes bad material and makes it fun and entertaining. However, not even Travolta can save Domestic Disturbance, one of the worst films of 2001.

Domestic Disturbance is the story of a young boy who witnesses his stepfather, played by Vince Vaughn, committing a murder. Is the kid crying wolf? Only his father played by Travolta believes he's telling the truth. Of course none of this matters to the audience who are always 20 minutes ahead of the characters.

The film's marketing campaign pretty well gives away the story by touting Travolta as the good guy. If he's the good guy obviously there is a bad guy, and make no mistake you already know who that is too. 

Of course, a good movie could possibly overcome such a bad marketing campaign. Unfortunately, Domestic Disturbance is a terrible film. There are stock characters and situations seen many times before and numerous other lame thriller shortcuts. The most egregious of the cliched cheats in Domestic Disturbance is the use of the child in danger trope. 

The oldest and arguably worst trick in the suspense genre, placing a child in danger is a cheap way to involve the audience. We may not care about the adult idiot characters, but a good person may worry about a child, even in the least convincing thriller.  That's not to say that Domestic Disturbance is effective in any way. Rather, it's a baseline of involvement akin to, hey, don't hurt that small child you idiotic film director. 

Domestic Disturbance also features the classic dumb thriller cop. A movie like Domestic Disturbance couldn't live without the dumb cop who, despite all the evidence, remains completely ignorant. A competent cop would require the screenwriters to do a little more work to make their plot believable and that would be way way more work than anyone involved in Domestic Disturbance wanted to do. 

Ignorant, brain-dead, and insulting, Domestic Disturbance will be on my list of the 10 worst films of the year.