Lange's horror-hag 'Hush'

12/17/99- Updated 01:08 PM ET
By USA TODAY
c Copyright 2000 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.


Hush, hush, sweet Jessica. Please.

It's far too soon for an actress as vital as Jessica Lange to
stoop to Bette Davis-Joan Crawford horror-hag histrionics. Not
that she hasn't been a few cashews short of a mixed-nut
assortment in movies such as Blue Sky. But the emotional
meltdown she endures as a maternal monster in Hush ( out of
four) — call it The Hand That Rocks the Cradle Is My Mother-
in-Law — makes the Wicked Witch of the West look like a
shrinking violet.

Don't let the tony decor fool you. Hush is recycled junk —
campy fun at times but total trash. If you can't see every
plot twist coming, rush to an optometrist now.

Borrowing from the parlance of Hush's horsy setting, handsome
stallion Johnathon Schaech brings his pretty filly (Gwyneth
Paltrow) to the sprawling family stable at Christmas to meet
his widowed mama (Lange). The ol' blond mare appears only a
little spooked. After the couple return to New York, though,
events conspire to force them back — an unplanned pregnancy,
a mugging — and after an elaborate wedding, they move in with
Lange.

Lies about Paltrow's supposedly frail condition and revelations
about the death of Schaech's father fail to drive the couple
away. The ever-more-devious Lange clearly has grand plans for
her grandchild — and they don't include her daughter-in-law.

The sylphlike Paltrow sleepwalks through this nonsense. Schaech
barely registers. Only delightful Nina Foch is unscathed as
Schaech's sly paternal granny who's stuck in an old folks home.
"Incompetent and incontinent" is how she describes herself.
"Unreliable at both ends." (PG-13: profanity, violence, brief
nudity)