confession: I liked the movie. I liked it a lot more than I thought I was going to...and a lot more than it probably deserves

Rating: 7/10 (19 September 2009)

I have a confession to make. It's almost like a plea of guilty to a criminal charge. I recently saw the Shia LaBeouf movie "Disturbia", which was a big hit among the teenage audience of 2007, and my 'crime' is that, much to my surprise and to my delight, I liked the movie. I liked it a lot more than I thought I was going to and frankly, a lot more than it probably deserves keeping in mind that this is a more than obvious rip-off of Alfred Hitchcock's 1954 thriller "Rear Window." So close are the two movies in plot (not story) that the producers of "Disturbia" actually now face a lawsuit for not obtaining the proper copyright permissions that would have allowed their film to be released without raising a legal bout.
As for me, I was surprised. No, it's not as good as "Rear Window". Not even close. It's standard, it's predictable, it's packed with clichés with almost all of its primal moments owed to the movie it is borrowing from, but in the end, I found myself moderately entertained from a movie I was rather sure I was going to find distasteful since it is a rip-off of one of my all-time favorites.
"Disturbia" is basically "Rear Window" converted for a teenage audience. Instead of a photographer crippled and confined to apartment by a broken leg, Shia LaBeouf stars an adolescent under house arrest for assault. After his mother severs the plug to his television, LaBeouf finds himself with little else to do but set up binoculars and video cameras at his windows and spy on his neighbors, including the new girl next door (Sarah Roemer) who likes to undress in front of an open window and a strange old man (David Morse) who he's convinced is a serial killer.
If you thought James Stewart's actions in "Rear Window" were a little unethical and perhaps a little creepy, wait till you get a load of LaBeouf in this movie. Actually, though, LaBeouf is what really this movie has to boast about and what the movie owes for its success. Shia LaBeouf, one of the more competent young actors of this generation, is very good in this movie. He brings a lot of charisma and enthusiasm to his role to make a surprisingly likable character out of who otherwise seems an obnoxious little punk in need of a lesson.
Like in "Rear Window", "Disturbia" sets up the plot and the characters for the first half of the movie, introduces the mystery about midpoint, and saves the third act for the majority of thrills and shocking moments. And although I was not 'scared out of my shoes' as a lot of my peers said I would be, I will admit there were some moments that had the hair of my arms raising and this made up for some moments that were otherwise quite dull and ponderous. The only thrill I had a problem with was the climax, which I felt was just cliché and out of place and didn't seem to correspond very well with the resolution.
Now what does not work in "Disturbia"? Well, apart from LaBeouf, there aren't any really interesting characters. Whereas James Stewart had a great supporting cast in "Rear Window", LaBeouf only has standard stick figures to call his allies. Sarah Roemer is a beautiful and surprisingly good young actress, but her character does not have much of a personality. Aaron Yoo, also competent, is just playing the typical dweeb's best friend here. And David Morse is not all that frightening of a villain as we can predict every single thing he's going to do next. And because of these weaker supporting characters, the middle of "Disturbia" lags a little.
In the end, I was delighted to admit that I was not bored to tears with "Disturbia" as I was afraid I was going to be. It does have its weaker points and moments and it's no classic like the film it's obviously mimicking, but it is a moderately competent thriller however clichéd and standard it may be.