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And
how the studios would love you, you’d be none-the-wiser that the film
you’ve just watched is a direct rip-off of something else that came out
twelve months before, and probably wouldn’t even consider blasting the
filmmakers on a forum somewhere.
What film buffs wouldn’t give to be hooked up to the memory-erasing epidural for a couple of hours.
If such a drug could be pumped through the body, it’d be best injected before watching say something like Disturbia
– the new teen thriller starring Shia LaBeouf. From simply reading the
premise alone – all three lines of it – it’s quite evident that
someone’s stolen the blueprint to Rear Window
(and that umpteenth knock-off’s that’s produced over the years;
including a recent remake of the same film) and simply cut and pasted
its libretto into a nice fresh word document. Cunning and creative
filmmaking at its best, ladies and gents.
So the question remains : It looks new; smells new; has some new touches – but does it play new?
Well
yes, it does – in the same way many mistake a cover song for an
original. You see, although it is merely a stitch-pattern of sequences
from other films (everything from Home Alone to Rear Window, The Bedroom Window and, even, Stakeout)
the script has been so funked up – in that it speaks its audience,
seemingly knowing exactly what they’d be after – that the contemporised
retool is instantly likeable.
It’s also genuinely thrilling at
times – and considering there’s two or three teen thrillers released
each month that don’t encompass one legitimate scare, that’s saying
something. The cleverness that Christopher Landon and Carl Ellsworth’s
script embodies is refreshing – they’ve written a fun movie, one that
delivers on most of its promises. It’s definitely one of the best
teenage thrillers to come along in quite some time.
The film
fixes on a messed up kid (he lost his dad (Matt Craven) in a car
accident a year before) who decides to “pop” his Spanish teacher one in
the nose. That little incident lands him under ‘House Arrest – a form
of at-home imprisonment where an electronic device, belted to the kids
ankle, goes off should he leave the vicinity of his home.
After
Kale (LaBeouf) has had enough with watching TV; eating junk and making
a ‘castle of twinkies’, he decides to do some spying – through his
window – at the neighbours. The person that gets the majority of peeps
is Ashley (Sarah Reomer), the bikini-clad babe who lives next door. At
the same time, he’s also watching the neighbour on the other side
(David Morse) a man who looks – and acts – suspiciously like the
murderer they’re talking about on TV.
Rising star Shia LaBeouf (most recently seen in Transformers and after that Indiana Jones 4)
again proves himself one of the most likeably young actors in cinema at
the moment – and an adaptable one at that. Even when the films at its
most implausible – which is quite often – he sells the thing. You
believe he is actually experiencing joy, terror, sadness and love –
respectively – when we reach those beats in the movie. In many ways, he
makes the movie.
D.J Caruso’s direction is also effective – from
the terrifying car crash at the films beginning to the effective pacing
of the plot, he seems to have found a genre he can handle (he hasn’t
done so well elsewhere). Considering his last effort Two for the Money – a sports comedy starring Matthew McConaughey and Al Pacino – was a bit splotchy, he has come a long way.
Yes
it’s full of plot holes. Yes it’s hokey. Yes David Morse’s bad guy is
rather unequivocal – but considering teenagers don’t pick apart films
like a critic, they’ll think Disturbia is heaven in a ticket stub.
EXTRAS
Extras include a video commentary with cast and crew, deleted scenes,
outtakes, music videos, featurettes and a pop-up quiz. Not a bad lot of
extras actually. Conclusion:
Movie 70% Extras: 60%
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