Review of Fear

Fear (1996)
4/10
Ridiculous Reaganite melodrama saved by screen presence of Witherspoon snd Wahlberg.
23 August 2022
Warning: Spoilers
16 year old 'daddy's girl' Reece Witherspoon lives in the shadow of her jealous father with his young trophy bride on an ultra high security compound set on a peninsula with swimming pool and 24 hour armed guards. Dad actually gives her a pendant that says Daddy's Girl so this is a film about incestuous jealousy first and class war between the high gated uber rich and homeless, white trash bums second.

At an edgy party attended by various obnoxious douchbags, microskirt-wearing Witherspoon meets handsome, tousle haired teenager Mark Wahlberg. They hit it off until Wahlberg, as insanely jealous as her father (and ready to take full possession from aging patriarch), hits her and her male friend for exchanging an innocent hug outside the school. Daddy sees Reece's black eye and forbids her from seeing Wahlberg. Well-connected dad gets police background checks on Wahlberg and, proving it is right to break the law when protecting your property) discovers he is an unwanted orphan from the wrong side of the tracks. Dad forbids Witherspoon from seeing Wahlberg but inevitably this has the opposite effect and penitent Wahlberg is soon frolicking in the family pool with daughter and trophy wife, much to dad's disgust. Worse, Wahlberg reveals his psycho side to dad by gloating about how he is turning both his wife and daughter on. Wahlberg takes Witherspoon to Carni land where he is able to get deep into second base on a rollercoaster.

This leads to denouement where Wahlberg reveals he is zombie apocalypse working class bent on snatching daughter (steals pendant and changes 'Daddy's Girl' to 'David's Girl' - yes really) but also class revenge with his ne'er do well junkie friends arriving in dirty old cars at secluded family home. They attack dad's fortress and kill armed guard after cutting off electricity and phone. Dad's real mistake is not having military grade automatic weapons to hand and failing to mine his garden. Fractured bourgeois family is now brought together in violent defence of stockaded homestead and brutal slaughter of devious, marauding rapist natives.

This is a slick Reaganite melodrama that will have your family baying for semi automatic rifles, police background checks and chastity belts.
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