UNFORGETTABLE (Rated R)

Take the “Un” out of the title of “Unforgettable” and what you have would be a fairly apt shorthand review of the suspense thriller hinging on the pathology of mental derangement engendered by familial discord.

In fact, the tagline for the movie, simply stated as “When Love Ends Madness Begins,” tells you mostly what is required to understand Katherine Heigl’s starring role of Tessa Connover, who is barely coping with the end of her marriage.

Before we get to the unraveling of Heigl’s character, the story opens with Rosario Dawson’s bloodied Julia Banks being questioned by the police about a man from her past having been murdered in a situation where it appears she’s the only suspect.

Flashback to six months earlier, a much happier Julia has just did farewell to her best friend Ali (Whitney Cummings) and her job in San Francisco and relocated to an idyllic suburban home in Southern California.

Her move has been prompted by an engagement to David Connover (Geoff Stults), the ex-husband of Tessa. Sharing the home with David and his young daughter Lily (Isabella Kai Rice), Julia is stepping into a new environment that is unfamiliar and somewhat challenging.

Julia is harboring a troubling secret of a past abusive relationship with an old boyfriend, one that left her so fearful that a soon-to-expire restraining order has caused much anxiety and expected fear.

Controlling and rigid, Tessa is almost immediately resentful of Julia’s facile charm and effortless beauty. It doesn’t help matters that Tessa is going to snap when she sees that David is truly in love with Julia, who is also gradually winning over her daughter.

Not long after Tessa and Julia first meet does it take anyone to realize one of them is going to come unhinged, and the dark period that continues to cloud Julia’s striving for the dream romance is not going to be a red herring.

How long will it take for someone to go over the edge? You can see the telltale signs everywhere, from the furtive glance to a snide remark and to finally the type of physical violence that is the culmination of craziness slowly oozing out of Tessa’s pores.

The rising tension between two women at odds over the love and admiration of one man is a certain recipe for a suspenseful thriller. The problem comes with laugh-induced moments that should have been somber and troubling.

“Unforgettable” not only fails to be memorable but its treatment of suspense is so formulaic as to be rendered suitable mainly for late night viewing on a cable channel.

‘Genius’ on National Geographic Channel

The National Geographic Channel has put so much faith in its scripted limited series “Genius” that the program has been renewed for a second season even before the first episode has aired.

Based on Walter Isaacson’s book “Einstein: His Life and Universe,” the ambitious program of “Genius” is to tell the entire story of the tumultuous private life of Albert Einstein, the great mind who personified the word “genius.”

Produced by Academy Award winners Ron Howard and Brian Grazer, “Genius,” judging by the first episode, explores the private of the revolutionary thinker in a non-lineal fashion, jumping back and forth through periods of time to illustrate his rise to fame as a theoretical physicist.

Everyone knows about the “theory of relativity,” but few know this German-born intellectual endured a difficult relationship with his father and the struggle of being a Jew living in his homeland during the rise of Hitler.

For all his brilliance, Einstein (portrayed by Geoffrey Rush as an adult) had troubled relations with women and his own children, to say nothing of how his rebellious nature caused him problems with teachers and scientific colleagues.

“Genius” begins with a young Einstein (Johnny Flynn) in conflict with his father as he drops out of school in Germany in order to further his studies in Switzerland, where he ultimately breaks the heart of his first love, Marie (Shannon Tarbet).

At the university in Zurich, he pursues the mysterious and elusive fellow physics student Mileva Maric (Samantha Colley), who would eventually become his first wife. Their first volatile encounters hardly seemed conducive to romance.

“Genius” requires the viewer to pay attention to the timelines, as the story jumps back and forth from Munich and Italy in 1894 and 1895, respectively, to Berlin in the Thirties and Forties, when the Brownshirts terrorized the public.

The first episode jumps right to this pre-World War II era when Einstein is now married to his second wife Elsa (Emily Watson), who happened to be his first cousin and endured his infidelities.

Exposing the great man for his flaws and sexual peccadilloes, “Genius” is also generous to demonstrate that his mind operated superior to his colleagues and adversaries.

“Genius” has a lot of ground to cover, including the years spent in the United States teaching at Princeton. This series should exceed at commanding attention of anyone fascinated by this complicated intellectual.
  
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.