Okay, little-known writer: a best-selling author in your genre needs you to finish her series because she’s been in a car accident and her hot husband thinks you’re keen. Their house is in rural Vermont, and their son lives on while his twin sister has passed away. As you begin your domestic study abroad retreat, you find an evil manuscript from said author. What do you do?

This is one of those storylines that I refer to as “something I would’ve come up with for my Barbie dolls as a child,” and for a campy movie, that is often a compliment. When a film tries to be serious, that description works against it. Verity walks the line.

In 2018, Colleen Hoover’s 17th book, “Verity,” hit shelves. It followed the success of “It Ends With Us,” another Hoover book recently adapted for film. The production of It Ends With Us (2024) was full of drama both on and offscreen, including a highly publicized and scrutinized lawsuit between leading actors Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni.

Verity, directed by Michael Showalter, has undergone a far less controversial press tour, although the film itself lacks the grounded three-dimensionality of It Ends With Us. Anne Hathaway plays the titular Verity, a famous dark novelist. Josh Hartnett is her husky husband Jeremy. Dakota Johnson plays our point-of-view protagonist Lowen, hired to finish Verity’s book series while she is incapacitated.

Verity closes out Hathaway’s generational run of films in 2026, preceded by Mother Mary, The Devil Wears Prada 2, The Odyssey, and The End of Oak Street. Hathaway shared that she hasn’t taken a day off in three and a half years, and intends to vanish into a plume of smoke for the rest of 2026 following Verity’s release.

Johnson has stayed steadily booked as well, most recently starring opposite Taylor Swift in Swift’s newest music video for “Patient Zero.” Critics often question Johnson’s acting, and my conclusion is simple: she’s an excellent actress, but she always plays Dakota Johnson. Some actors lack versatility but can make the situations they’re in feel believable. Johnson is in good company in this camp, with the likes of Timothée Chalamet and Meg Ryan (albeit both of whom typically manage to deliver more dynamic performances). A contrasting example is Robert Pattinson, a chameleon in every role he steps into, who seems to be competing with Hathaway for the “most-booked this year” superlative.

Hathaway’s performance as Verity consists of two states of being, cartoonishly confined to their respective facial expressions: sultry and zombie. Sultry Verity makes a meal out of every line, smirking with red lips and bringing new meaning to the word “mother.” Zombie Verity is impressively vacant and hauntingly half-dead. The latter is the force that classifies the film as a thriller, her subtle movements creating constant paranoia in Lowen (although not enough to give her any hesitation in her affair with Jeremy or her cruelty towards Verity).

Verity is a faithful adaptation of the novel, from Jeremy and Lowen’s manslaughter meet-cute to the infamous bite marks on the bed headboard. However, the biggest deviation from the book (aside from Hathaway and Johnson’s steamy makeout sesh) is the merging of the children’s storylines. In the book, Verity has three kids: her oldest son, Crew, and two twin daughters named Chastin and Harper.

Book Verity bonds with Chastin, but she resents Harper and blames her for Chastin’s death, which was caused by a fatal allergic reaction to peanuts. When Book Verity drowns Harper, she intentionally saves Crew. The film instead eliminates Chastin and makes Crew (Brady Wagner) and Harper (Sienna Kulovitz) twins, broadly showing Verity hating both of them, surprised to see Crew survive the lake incident.

The story poses a simple question: What is the truth? The titular character is named after a term meaning “the quality or state of being true or real.” So which Verity possesses verity? Who in this story, if anyone, is a reliable narrator?

Lowen, in her grief for her mother’s passing, alongside other general baggage, is seen constantly consuming alcohol and Xanax. Yet she has the eyes through which we read Verity’s incriminating autobiography written like a kinslayer confession.

But once it’s too late, and Lowen has successfully stolen Verity’s life after treating this writing as binding honesty, Lowen finds a different piece of writing: a letter explaining that the manuscript was merely a writing exercise to improve Verity’s skill set as a horror author, to process her real grief for her child by creating a fictional villain in herself. The letter also implicates Jeremy as a liar who attempted to murder Verity in the car crash that was deemed Verity’s suicide attempt, despite his “shocked” performance when Lowen showed him the manuscript.

As we struggle to decide whether we can trust Jeremy, Verity’s letter, Verity’s manuscript, or even Lowen’s questionable storytelling, one thing is certain: these are characters wrought with moral ambiguity, more often than not making selfish and deceitful choices.

The filmic format elevates the book’s narrative by fully showing Hathaway in character for each possible Verity. We see Verity flipping the canoe and breaking her sobbing facade as she gives her statement to the police. Later, as Lowen reads the letter falsifying the manuscript, we see someone on Verity’s publishing staff tell her to try the writing exercise, and shots of Verity weeping in mourning for her child as she writes the manuscript. We get believable performances in both camps, fueling a debate over which is true.

Unfortunately, the mystery falls flimsy. Instead of a thought-provoking ending that lends to discussion and debate, Barbie-doll playtime storyline plot holes appear.

Why would Verity be so expositional in her final note, if she thought Jeremy was going to be the one to read it? Half of the things she mentions feel shoehorned in since he should’ve known them already. Why wouldn’t she label the top of her manuscript: “WRITING EXERCISE” or something else that adds context in case it falls into the wrong hands? Why couldn’t she manage to sputter out “It’s a writing exercise; it helped me write my villains!” as Jeremy approaches her at the end? The answer to all of the above: Because then we wouldn’t have this convoluted, twisted web of moderate intrigue.

Despite its categorization as a thriller and a drama, my friend and I found ourselves to be the only ones laughing frequently at our sold-out screening. To establish Verity’s fame and psyche, she guest stars on Call Her Daddy and Hot Ones. Similar to Adults (2025–), which makes use of real man-on-the-street TikTok interviewers, we’re witnessing a shift from the classic late-night show being a representation of fictional characters achieving stardom.

Not only are these interviews introductory to the film, but the final scene features a Hot Ones question where Verity responds by emphasizing the ways she loves to play with her audience’s perception of the truth. My favorite Letterboxd review of the film simply says: “It Ends With Sean Evans,” playing off It Ends With Us and this hilariously odd setting to conclude Verity’s narrative.

The potentially unintentional comedy factor doesn’t stop there. As the story unfolds, dramatic close-ups of Lowen’s face feature overlays of the forest and lake surrounding the house, or Verity’s written words sliding across the screen. It heavily evokes Twilight (2008), particularly given Lowen’s massive character resemblance to Bella Swan, and the dark, wintry setting. This connection is ironic in light of Johnson’s breakout film series Fifty Shades of Grey (2015) being based on a Twilight fan fiction. Her web connects them all.

Verity’s manuscript prefaces the dark tales that lie ahead by saying, “But know one thing: there is no light where we’re going.” I’d argue that viral YouTube interviewers, a cupcake makeout scene, and some hilarious over-the-top servitude from Sultry Flashback Verity should alter that to say, “But know one thing: there is a little bit of campy light, but mostly darkness where we’re going.”

Much like The Housemaid (2025), The Idea of You (2024), and any other junk food slumber party film, Verity is delectable if you don’t take it too seriously.

Review Courtesy of Risa Bolash

Feature image credit to Amazon MGM Studios