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Disturbia (2007)

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Disturbia. Feature film. (2007, 105 mins) IMDB

...it could have been far worse...

I

t's not officially a remake but it is. This is modern take on REAR WINDOW. Instead of a photographer (Jimmy Steward) locked up in his apartment in NYC because of a broken leg, this film has a teenaged boy under house arrest with an ankle alarm. If he leaves the property, an alarm goes off and the police come right away and they do.

In the opening sequence he drives the family car on a highway. His father is in the passenger seat. Out of nowhere, the car collides with another and another. The father is dead. The son is quilt ridden.

The three months of house arrest (punishment for something that happened a year later) coincides with the summer months away from school. But his mother cuts the cable, internet, video games. With nothing to do, he becomes a voyeur and there's plenty of things to watch from his bedroom. Note: the family lives in a one-off spacious home as designed by Hollywood. Note: there is far more activity seen from his window than would be realistic. That's Hollywood and filmmaking.

He has a school friend who visits from time to time.

Then there's a new neighbour--a young, sexy woman his age. Of course she had to be the thin, blonde instead of a chubby bookworm with glasses. He loves to watch her undress and so do the kids in the theatre watching.

And there's the other neighbour (David Morse). He's a serial killer except our hero can't prove it and no one believes him.

The film leads to a point where there is a drag-out-to-the-death fight between the serial killer and this sixteen year old boy.

The film is surprisingly effective even if we know the outcome. In the end he is vindicated and he kills the killer. The hidden recesses of the neighbour's house looks like an anatomy theatre. The cops eventually come. His mother is saved, his girlfriend is saved, his best friend wasn't killed.

Still it is a teenager being a teenager and plenty of Hollywood non-sense. A film for teenagers, but it could have been so much worse.

Posted 2009/06/03 at 20h05ET in Movie Commentary.

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