Listen up minions.

Rating: 7/10 (28 February 2009)

Matthew Kidman is a straight 'A' student, goodness pours from his every pore, but something is missing in his life. Then one day the unthinkable happens, the sultry and sexy girl next door becomes his girlfriend. But a skeleton in the closet and a voyage of discovery will ensure that their destinies are about to hit a riotous road.
The Girl Next Door is bawdy, smutty and, plot wise? As stale as two week old bread, it's also excellently written, charming and as funny as heck! The teen sex comedy is by and large a tired old genre, so how nice to visit this 2004 effort to find that it wears its heart on its sleeve and clearly wants to be a message movie with brains as well as heart. Featuring the "Adult Movie Industry" as it does, the piece could so easily have been an excuse for garnering cheap sexy laughs out of flesh for fantasy situations, oh they are there for sure, but for every nerdy wet dream gag, we have it cloaked in intelligence of thought provoking interest.
Taking the lead female role, and positively oozing sexuality, is Elisha Cuthbert, wonderfully essaying the working girl who really does just see her profession as a means to an end, with true love seemingly passing her by. On top nerd form we have Emile Hirsch {Matthew}, Paul Dano and Chris Marquette, with Timmothy Olyphant doing a smashing weasel turn as a troublesome producer and ex boyfriend of Cuthbert. Bonus comes in cameo form from the ever watchable James Remar, for the ladies his thong wearing skit is of interest surely, for us blokes his sequences are comedic joy only! It's interesting looking at the respective careers of those involved, Cuthbert was the draw card here, yet she has gone on to become something of a C movie star, starring in such poor fare as Captivity. Whilst Hirsch has since wowed audiences in films like Into The Wild and Milk, while Dano of course featured heavily in the hugely successful There Will Be Blood. Sometimes it's obvious that beauty can only get you so far.
I personally really enjoyed this film for a number of reasons, so give it a try and you might just feel the same. 7/10