Open House (2003 TV Movie) User Reviews (8)

So Daniel Baldwin is the brother with talent.

[sactoflo · 7/10 · 17 February 2003]

I was so impressed by Baldwin's performance. What a special treat in a sometimes cute but pretty lame movie. I thought Christine Lahti was a little over the top, as I saw it. She missed her calling anyway. She should have been a swimsuit model. She has to have the best figure in the business. Rita Moreno was excellent as usual, & Eva Marie Saint wasn't quite up to her usual standard, but she's never anything but good at the very least. The kid was very good, the teen was fine, the husband really wasn't there for me.

I was just so overwhelmed by Baldwin's work here. You have to see it, should it ever be shown again, just to see this guy handle the part. It's a jaw dropper I tell ya. I sure hope there happened to be industry folks with nothing to do but watch a tv movie on this night, because if they were watching, we'll be seeing more of Daniel Baldwin; & it couldn't be too soon for me.

Wife Was No Good In Bed !

[whpratt1 · 6/10 · 22 March 2006]

The movie starts out with love making going on in the bedroom of Travis Morrow,(Mark Rendall), and his wife, Samantha Morrow,(Christine Lahti) tells her husband, "I Hope it was Good for You, It is always Good for Me" and after looking at the expression on her husbands face, you just simply know what is going to happen next, and maybe you don't. Great acting by Eva Marie Saint,(Veronica Reynolds) who does everything she can to help her daughter realize the pitfalls in married life. Daniel Baldwin,(King) has deep feelings for Samantha and for some reason Samantha just considers him as a good friend and nothing more. The moral in this picture is sex is not everything in a marriage, it sure helps but going off the deep end and creating a big problem for yourself solves nothing.

Greatest acting ever by a Baldwin

[heavenwardbound88 · 10/10 · 11 July 2005]

My daughter and I watched this movie last night and we really enjoyed it. We loved the part of King. Here he was brilliant, and could do whatever he wanted and still make a living and a good one at that. I know it was just a movie, but his apartment was to die for. His acting was the greatest of any of the other Baldwins to date. Wish we could see more of him in the similar kind of movie. He played every woman's dream, it is that some of us are just to dumb to know it. Christine Lahti was okay, she looked way too old for Baldwin. Lavender the teenage girl was great. We liked how she handled the kid when he finally came back home, when he was throwing things around his room. I believe that part of the movie helped them both and it showed other kids with the same problem that they can look at this differently and move on with your life. Eva Marie Saint did well as your pushy mother, but I wouldn't have put her as a man chaser, seems that was all she could talk about. Rita Marino was great, wish we could see more of her, of course it would need to be rated PG-13 are we won't be watching. David the husband, was David who? I can't stand any one that plays those parts, I know that someone has to do it, but I still don't like them.

Pleasant enough

[vchimpanzee · 12 July 2005]

I'm glad I didn't see this until after I spent a year watching Christine Lahti as Grace on the excellent 'Jack and Bobby' TV series. Lahti shows her talent here too, and if she was better in the series, that's only because there was such excellent writing there. But this was pretty good.

Daniel Baldwin was very appealing as the MIT astrophysics graduate who takes odd jobs--including helping Samantha's husband David move out after he decided to end the marriage--because he wants to enjoy life. Samantha kept encountering him again not just because she needed ways to make money, but because she had the worst luck with men.

Grace Lynn King really shined as the rebellious but likable Lavender Blue, whose parents named her Kimiko. She ended up moving into Samantha's basement to help Samantha pay her mortgage.

Colin Cowie was also quite good as the TV host who Samantha relied on for advice. Also good were Eva Marie Saint as Samantha's mother, Rita Moreno as Lydia, the woman who rented David's former study, and Tom Harvey as Lydia's boyfriend.

This was a pleasant TV-movie, nothing more.

Open House (2003) : good family show

[msbsegal · 10/10 · 6 February 2008]

07 FEB 2008 I saw it to-day on cable TV and enjoyed it, true story about everyday life people, their struggles, fights, pains and hopes and joys.

The commentary written "corny spoilers" is completely wrong, and it missed the story in such an amazing way, I wonder why did you not correct the more evident mistakes ? In any case other commentators got the story right.

I think the acting was good and convincing, they all played and made the story a great movie. If you do not like romance then this is not for you, but if you do like it, then you will have a great time and get some healthy advice on many subjects. Sit back and enjoy !

Well..

[ts-0000 · 9 April 2024]

Could of been way better.. But won't pick it apart,well too much. :) If it was presented about a women dealing with divorce & being a mom,that handles as a landlord colorful characters that rent in order to keep her home.

Plus along the way finds love,independence & healing might of been greater.

Just happy.. She didn't lower herself & accept hubby back,just because he decided it was convenient.

It was cast fine & acting also decent enough,just feel as mentioned the storyline/dialog could of been improved.

This movie didn't"exactly"drag,but just needing something more too.

Not sure what else to say but apparently this website,expects you to be overly wordy on all reviewed movies.

Think Bruiser(Moonie)was the pet,used in Legally Blonde movies.

Is this worth seeing? Sure. Passes time on a boring day,but not something in my watch it again category.

corny SPOILER WARNING

[ahonigs · 21 April 2003]

As i watched "Open House", i found myself laughing numerous times, and not from the genuine humor. No better way to cheapen sex, folks, than to call it a "fire in your belly". The kid is not as all convincing in the minutiae of how they really live today in the suburbs. The baseball cards, dinosaur models and other baby boom items the live-in home refugee knocks off the shelves are not, i tell you what you would find for the most part. The movie earns the IMDB genre designation "musical" because of the usual passel of songs interspersed on the soundtrack. Anyway, the plot. A single woman moves into a new house with her preteen son after her ex marries another (as always caricaturishly bimboish) woman. The woman is named Samantha Morrow and her kid is Travis, her ex being the ever-so-subtly named King. She runs around lamenting her finances and preaching cheesy sentimental novel thrift and gratitude, takes bubblebaths and calls men names in the usual thread of overacting. The mover who Samantha takes a liking to is Colin Cowie II, really and truly. The Asian teenager with her pitiful broken-home upbringing (i say my following statements in sarcastic satire as i beleive there to be much latent racism in this offering) Lavender Blue (heh, heh) slowly overcomes her whiny ungrateful little teenage hormonitude (i know that"s not a word. Lavender Blue is the one who, after a curiously forced scene of the kid complaining about not having time for little things like knowledge, recreation, etc. and that is the one where the she decks the toys and regales us with her broken Asian home tale. Situations like those in "Better Luck Tomorrow" aside, i think we all know very well that image is a little off. There's also a cliched scene where Sam gets to rant the same. There are no black characters (except perhaps in some minute parts) and i'm not faulting them for that since this probably just isn't the kind of suburb where they would usually live. And Samantha has a "friend", Lydia who carries out a Hispanic madam former broad routine as she goes through love for a second time (after her obligatory failure at attracting the right fella to pay the bills). At times i half expected her (being played by Rita Moreno) to "belt out" something Lawrence-Welky (and i live with an old person so don't think i don't know what i'm talking about) like "I'm gonna let it shine" which i beleive is every fundamentalist and racist's favorite gospel songs (sing with me now, Sen. Lott!). It was filled with this sort of stereotyping, which was, i'll grant them well concealed, so i was usually laughing when not offended (I'm white}. There were also many illogical moments like (since they've gotta keep it a PG miniseries) the cut from when she's in the back seat of a woody with a man doing nothing happening to her saying (behold future bestseller writers) "men are pigs including you". Smart. And the wedding reception, complete with either badly choreographed or just plain bad dancing 'round the punch table, seemed to be composed of primarily the 40+ crowd with, amazingly, only two exceptions (the teen and the kid of course). Again the kid carried the not-so-high fashion of toys (i half-expected him to play the Game of States) which gave me so many chuckles. Anyway it never made feel as much as it made me raise my eyebrow and laugh at its pure corniness. 2003 CBS (imagine that) TV-movie.

Fairly boring attempt at family drama

[mikiboy · 9 September 2004]

Having read the first description on IMDb of this film, I could not believe it referred to the same film as the one which I watched? Yes, the girl (Samantha) was abandoned by her husband (David - NOT King) but she remained in the family home rather than moved to another, as the earlier review mistakenly stated. Then she met 'King' with whom she became romantically involved - with the rest of the film revolving around their gently developing romance. Rita Moreno played the part of a lodger at the home of Samantha as did the young Asian girl 'Lavendar'. Generally the film was quite predictable and although never controversial, it sufficed to entertain in a gentle way. Does Christine Lahti (Samantha) ever play a different role as they all seem so very similar to one another??