Some spills, empty chills and no thrill

Rating: 4/10 (10 September 2007)

"A Scorching Nail-Biter," read the poster with Shia LaBeouf holding a set of binoculars partially masking his face that reminded you of James Stewart with his camera on the posters of the Alfred Hitchcock 1954 classic 'Rear Window'a movie to which this bears 'disturbi(a)'ing similarities.
But Disturbia fails at delivering an updated 'modern day teen version' of the Hitchcock masterpiece. It tracks the life of a troubled teen, Kale (LeBeouf), under house arrest after losing the handle on his emotions following losing his father in a road accident.
Having gorged on enough peanut butter while confined within four walls, Kale begins a voyeuristic pursuit at his neighbours who include the quiet and sinister Mr. Turner (David Morse) and the bikini clad, sun bathing new neighbour Ashley (Sarah Roemer) who spends more time reading Nabokov's 'Lolita' on the roof of her house than inside it. The evil Mr. Turner who catches Kale's fantasy as he begins drawing parallels between Mr. Turner and the man reported to have butchered 6 girls across the 'suburbia'.
Regrettably for a thriller one gets a whiff of the ending before the movie ends and only Morse's presence and D. J. Caruso's direction save it from being a collection of average thrill sequences. The movie looks like a lot of YouTube stuff was thrown in at a classic Hitchcock thriller. Unfortunately, they do not mix well.