Teen-Oriented Voyeuristic Tale Unravels Hitchcock's Inspiration in Favor of Cheap Scares

Rating: 4/10 (6 September 2007)

First things first, the only similarity this 2007 movie has with Alfred Hitchcock's classic voyeuristic thriller, 1954's Rear Window, is the basic concept of a temporarily immobile protagonist who sees highly suspicious activity from a distance only to find he may be endangered by what he may have witnessed. Other than the central plot device, the comparison falls apart since director D.J. Caruso (The Salton Sea) seems intent on making a teen-oriented thrill ride driven by angst and hormones. The focal point is teenaged Kale Brecht who has to spend his summer under police surveillance through a motion-detection ankle bracelet. The laborious set-up for this situation takes a good half-hour, though this is likely the best part of the film as it begins with a car crash visceral in impact and impressive in technical execution.
Reeling from the tragic results of the accident, Kale punches his Spanish teacher in the face, for which the bracelet is his punishment. Increasingly bored and incorrigible, he has his electronic toys taken away by his exasperated mother, leaving him nothing to do but watch his neighbors with binoculars. Two figures new to the neighborhood come into focus - Ashley, a comely neighbor who becomes Kale's object of pubescent desire, and Mr. Turner, a taciturn bachelor whose suspicious behavior peaks Kale's interest and imagination. What happens next is unfortunately predictable and downright lazy, as screenwriters Carl Ellsworth and Christopher B. Landon eschew much of the psychological elements of the supposedly tense situation in favor of overly familiar, crowd-pleasing scare tactics.
The violent, drawn-out finale is beyond absurd and further saddled by the restrictions of the film's PG-13 rating. In a role almost identical to the one he plays in Transformers, Shia LaBeouf brings energy and at times surprising gravity to Kale though not enough to compensate for the script's shortcomings. Sarah Roemer, looking like a cross between Kate Hudson and Jessica Biel, plays Ashley as a stock Lolita figure at least until she is called on conveniently to become resourceful. Even though he has the funniest lines, Aaron Yoo's role as goofball best pal Ronnie is poorly conceived to fit the plot machinations, and bereft of her Matrix coolness factor, Carrie-Anne Moss seems ill-used as Kale's put-upon mother. With his soft voice and unshakable manner, David Morse looks like he is having a good time playing Turner, but the character's revelations toward the end unravel any momentum of fear he was able to muster before.