Disturbia
April. 13,2007 PG-13Kale is a 17-year-old placed under house arrest after punching his teacher. He is confined to his house, and decides to use his free time spying on his neighbors. Things start to get weird when guests enter the Turner's house and don't come back out. Kale and his friends, Ronnie and Ashley, start to grow more and more interested in what is actually happening within the house of Robert Turner.
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Reviews
I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much
Truly Dreadful Film
While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.
There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.
This is a tough one to review. On the one side I remember really enjoying this as a smart little teen thriller back in my youth. Re-watching it now, it's far too clichéd and problematic to withstand any real thrills. Do I score this based on the time it was released, or how badly it's dated? We shall see. A grieving and troublesome boy is put under house arrest where he lives his daily routine by spying on his neighbours, a new girl on the block on one side and a potential serial killer on the other. You could class this as a modernised version of Hitchcock's famous 'Rear Window', it does indeed pay homage to this in a few subtle ways. The slow build up of suspense and tension is well crafted, much like 'Rear Window'. The first half is focussed purely on building up the protagonist, the second then descends into thriller territory. Do the two marinate? Not consistently. It does feel like you are watching two different films. A comedic light hearted teen flick then contrasts with a dark suspenseful thriller. I understand why, to show that any neighbourhood no matter how pleasant the exterior seems does indeed hold ominous secrets. In this case, a murdering psychopath. Separately these two halves work really well and are thoroughly enjoyable, although filled with mediocrity. They just don't blend together. Shia LaBeouf actually gives a decent lead performance. David Morse and Carrie-Anne Moss needed way more screen time, although the former was very menacing. Unfortunately, director DJ Caruso was too focussed on filming Sarah Roemer's ass and having fans blow into the actor's faces just to blissfully move their hair in a gentle breeze to care about the technical aspects of the film. The cheap alt-rock soundtrack, the forced romance which amounts to nothing in the final act and lack of character development. The whole film felt mediocre, but still pleasantly enjoyable. It's a weird one this, but I'm in a good mood so will grant it with the higher score. Entertaining but far too many flaws.
Really starts out good. I even cheered at one scene at the beginning. Somewhere around the middle of the movie, it all starts going downhill. Unnecessary and very cheesy romantic situations, logic plot holes big enough to fly a death star through, characters just behaving odd. The last 15 or 20 minutes or so only work if every single one character behaves as stupid as possible on every single occasion. Carrie-Anne Moss' character is totally underdeveloped. While her son is going through a lot of pain, there never seems to be a hint of her feeling anything similar about the situation. I just changed the rating from 4 to 3 while writing this. I better stop before it drops even lower.
What a great premise...teen in a great old house with sloppy tendencies and TONS of electronic stuff {stretched a bit, for me!}, watching his neighbours while he is under observation and electronically 'wired' to his house and yard. Acting is good, especially Roehmer {mmmmm}; they could have dropped the Asian guy {but he was 'ok'}, demon-looking neighbour. But the movie gets RIDICULOUS 3/4's of the way through, and is just plain STUPID at the end. Don't bother with the last portion ~ just watch the first 3/4 of it..and you can figure it out!
Director D.J. Caruso isn't a bad Filmmaker but is not Great by any means. He occasionally makes interesting Films like "The Salton Sea" (2002) and "Taking Lives" (2004). But "By the Numbers" most of the time. This is one of those.No surprises, not much Style, and conspicuously cute, this is a rather tame take on Hitchcock's "Rear Window" (1954) by way of "Teen Romantic Angst". Shia Labeouf is a nervous, hyper-active Actor that has attained Star Status way beyond His ability to transform or "Act" like anything more than what He is. One Role is the same turn as another.Here He is upstaged on every level by David Morse, if not everyone else, who does just what the Script calls for and nothing more. The Buddy Sidekick is annoying most of the time and the pretty "Girl Next Door" is pretty smart but the Chemistry between the Teens is nothing short of standard stuff and Clichéd.The Movie meanders along with one scene melting into the next until commonplace and complacency sets in and all of sudden the Third Act wakes from its comatose state and erupts in a frenzied finale that is all over the place and never settles in a coherent display of what is happening.The Film is Slightly Overrated and a bland, borderline boring Psychological Thriller that never quite thrills or goes very deep into the Mind of the Killer. Young People who don't have very much Film Going Experience may find it more entertaining than others. But it is just too safe and saccharine for its Own Good and is never intriguing or intense. Just another exercise in Standard Stuff Movie Making.