The Boy Next Door, Review: Lo ranking

Shortly after her divorce from a philandering husband, a woman (school teacher) gets seduced by a mysterious younger man, ostensibly to look after his grand-uncle, who just moved-in across the street. Her ‘reformed’ ex-husband is keen on reconciliation, while the obsessed ‘boy next door’ resorts to stalking and blackmail, to keep them apart. He first befriends her teenage son and brain-washes him against her, and then joins her class at school, making it impossible to keep him away. The woman, who treats the one-night stand with the neighbour as a mistake committed in a weak, lonely moment, almost re-unites with her husband, making the stalker resort to extreme steps that do not exclude murder.

The Boy Next Door is author Barbara Curry’s first filmed work. Curry spent nearly a decade as an assistant U.S. attorney, working in the Major Violent Crimes unit on federal cases that included contract killing, racketeering, arson, kidnapping, bank robbery and conspiracy.

The Boy Next Door was on the 2011 Bloodlist of the industry’s most-liked genre scripts. An UCLA screenwriting graduate, she has already won three Screenwriting Showcase Awards, as well as the George Burns & Gracie Allen Fellowship in comedy screenwriting, the Reel Spirit Screenwriting Prize and the Diane Thomas Screenwriting Award. These impeccable credentials make you wonder whether the film under review was really written by her. There are issues of loopholes, mistakes of history, inconsistencies of characters, and sharp turns in the narrative that signal an entirely new ambience emerging.

Rob Cohen (The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, The Fast and the Furious) was born in New York. He attended Harvard University, where he graduated magna cum laude with a degree in Anthropology. If one were to base his study of people on the basis of The Boy Next Door, one would conclude that most of us are confused, convoluted and irrational. Be that as it may, a film has to go much beyond stating the obvious to become entertaining or, at least, engaging. Sexual content is not unsually erotic. Violence is gruesome, what little there is of it. Very often, it appears that this film is the first or second work of a director, not of a veteran of Cohen's standing.

The name Jennifer Lopez (JLo variant included) does not trigger any expectations of consummate acting. Born Jennifer Lynn Lopez in New York, the 45 year-old is a businesswoman, dancer, and recording artist. Her breakthrough role as the leading actress in the biographical film Selena earned her a Golden Globe nomination, and roles in The Wedding Planner and Maid in Manhattan followed.  Set your standards really Lo, and you might not be badly disappointed with this outing. Her co-star is Ryan Guzman, who recently appeared in Pretty Little Liars, and also worked in Always Woodstock, April Rain, and Step Up All In. He has some facial resemblance to Paul Newman and a torso that is sure to be the envy of less privileged bodies. Guzman was asked by a publication how he had handled seducing Lopez, and replied, “I'm still looking to find that out, I don't know.”

Playing the husband is John Corbett, 54-year-old American actor, known for his roles on Sex and The City and My Big Fat Greek Wedding, and also a country singer. There’s not much of a back-story to add depth to the characterisation, yet one or two scenes featuring the couple are effective. Ian Nelson makes a convincing son. Lexi Atkins as Allie, his romantic interest, doesn’t look the ‘most beautiful’ girl she is to him, with a caveat that beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder. Thin, scrawny, high-pitched Kristin Chenworth (who works in the fields of music, stage and television, besides film) finds herself stereo-typed as the Vice-principal, but turns it to her advantage. The one scene where she takes on the crazy boy has sparks flying, only to peter out to empty threatening. Hill Harper adds a quiet dignity to the part of the Principal.

At least half-a-dozen films in the ‘obsessive lover, voyeur, stalker, hunter’ milieu come to mind when confronted with The Boy Next Door. All of them rank rather high, while this one gets a Lo ranking.

Rating: *1/2

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgbBwovOOoc