This is one of the most unsatisfying films I have seen in a long time. Usually my judgement of what films looks watch-able is right, the film that comes close to this is Transcendence which I saw last year, but I didn't choose to see this, my mother did, probably because Jennifer Lopez was in it, ah the sweet sell of celebrity endorsement. Jennifer, plays mother Claire, who generically is on a break from her husband after he cheated on her. Coincidently, Claire gets a new neighbour, nineteen year old Noah who seems genuinely caring at first. Claire is a school teacher, and after a brief romantic encounter with Noah, he forges an email from her to the principal asking to enrol him in her class. Son Kevin obviously becomes good friends with Noah thus playing into Noah's manipulative plans.
Things I liked:
Ryan Guzman (Noah) actually played the role of a stalker very well, his pure rage and convincing anger and posture was great, however unfortunately the plot let him down, not his fault though.
Some nice camera shots and settings. Especially the scene where Noah kidnaps a character in her own home, the camera focuses on him and excruciatingly slowly, it tracks backwards until we are shown who he is talking to, the character in focus tied up in a chair.
Things I disliked:
Weak characters: Apart from Noah, the rest of the characters were not developed enough for my liking, it was rushed.
Weak story-lines: It relied too heavily on cliché and generic thriller moments, oh I'm just going to sneak into your house while your on your way home, oh the tempo goes up, oh its a race against time, oh build up again, oh I just turned around and shockingly it wasn't you, but moments later when the tempo dies down, you appear again... thrilling.
Absolutely shocking ending: I was actually taken a back, the ending was appalling, and sorry spoiler alert Noah is killed at the end, but then it finishes, literally he dies, they go off in an ambulance and it bloody ends, its not only unsatisfying, it's so lazy, and I feel quite cheated after paying to see a movie which doesn't offer anything at the end, I have paid an extortionate fee to see some generic thriller moments, with a cliché ending, only to find out there's nothing more to it.
The deaths in the film were not tied up, oh just kill a character and leave her there, this is what I mean about laziness, you get no feedback from Claire's family about what Noah did, what happened after the event, what happened to the principal, what happened to Noah's granddad he was looking after, what happened to the evidence in Noah's creepy stalker basement? No question from the police, or the school.
Although I like Jenny, and I have seen her in a few of her films, I didn't like the character. Yes at the right moment she played the terrified woman great, she was shocked at the right times and was acceptable, but other times it was a bit bland, I think she was trying to hard but just came off as generic, I wanted to see more emotive projections, but I suppose she can't wholly be blamed for the terrible script. Her character's son too, he over played it too with the 'tantrums' and if you were so close to your mother, wouldn't you be more clued up. He wasn't consistent with the hating his dad either, but hey, crap script.
The connection between Noah and Claire was confusing, first she's peaking through the blinds looking at him, then sleeping with him and then he's full on stalking her straight away, it just doesn't set well, it's not believable.
Overall, I am very disappointed, not wonder it scored a 4.3 on IMDB, I would give it a 4 out of 10 too.
No comments:
Post a Comment