The Glass House

Leelee Sobieski stars in this failed spine-tingler about a teenage girl whose parents die in a car crash leaving her and her little brother a $4 million trust that their new guardians (Stellan Skarsgård and Diane Lane in superbly creepy performances) are just itching to get their hands on--at any cost. The Glass House's talented cast is wasted and its great thriller potential cheapened beyond belief by frying-pan-to-the-head foreshadowing, insultingly over-scripted metaphors (Sobieski's lit class is reading Hamlet) and indulgent, undignified bits of exploitation. While there's a smart, sly film lurking beneath this hackneyed garbage, director Daniel Sackheim apparently didn't have enough respect for his audience to make it. Not a necessary purchase. (R. Blackwelder)