The Boy Next Door | Film Review

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: Guy has a brief, torrid affair with a woman he shouldn’t, attempts to break it off for all of the right reasons, woman decides the world is a better place with everyone the guy loves in the ground and proceeds to make this guy’s life a living hell. Now switch out the guy for middle-aged Jennifer Lopez and exchange that crazy woman for an ‘almost 20’ year old young stud (Ryan Guzman). You now understand the new-aged version of the decades old plot found in ‘The Boy Next Door’.

The problem with ‘The Boy Next Door’ is that, unlike ‘Fatal Attraction’, the film refuses to allow any responsibility to fall on the gorgeous shoulders of its heroine, Claire Peterson (Lopez). After Claire’s new neighbor, Noah (Guzman), repeatedly shows off his glistening abs and affinity for literature (which Claire happens to teach at her son’s school and Noah quickly enrolls in), their tryst is more coincidental than expected.

Following a bad date, Claire chugs wine like a champ and randomly drops by Noah’s kitchen fairly inebriated. She says no several times before eventually succumbing to his sexual insistence, cementing the fact that this copulation is REALLY not Claire’s fault. After awaking from her apparent drunken stupor, Claire realizes she just slept with a high school student and breaks it off as jarringly as possible. Because she hasn’t made too many other rash judgments, she almost immediately starts things back up with her ex-husband, which sends poor Noah into an insanely blind rage that should send anyone with half the IQ of Claire’s literature teacher scurrying off to the police quicker than any of us in the audience could spell Homer’s Odyssey.

Of course that would make a pretty dull film and, through all of its faults, director Rob Cohen’s The Boy Next Door is never dull. It is also 100% ridiculous and completely cops out in regards to Claire’s involvement in her own affair (even going so far as to make Noah a legal-aged student), but it is a fairly entertaining absurdity if you are willing to check all logic at the door. And hey, at least we have Kristin Chenoweth cracking wise in the background to keep the film’s legitimacy strong.

Jennifer Lopez does an admirable job attempting to keep this Lifetime-plot saucy enough for the big-screen, and given a stronger script with less obvious clichés, this could have been a performance many discussed for weeks to come. That is the inherent problem with this ‘Boy’, the first half of the film tells an intriguing tale of a middle-aged woman who succumbs to temptation with a man half her age. Had the film played this issue out honestly, I would be raving about Lopez’s brave efforts to turn a corner in her career by showcasing a fully nuanced and sincere character.

Instead, we are left with a main character who does everything wrong yet refuses to own up to it and a decent psycho in Guzman who takes stalking to an Olympic-caliber level. He also apparently morphs fairly quickly into the kind of guy who could casually and brutally murder Claire and her son without a second’s thought. Reflection on the film after the fact will not improve this experience nor will it make any more sense.

If you are looking for a guilty pleasure, you could easily do better. That said, The Boy Next Door is not a total travesty as Lopez gives it her all and the film is fairly entertaining for all of its nutty character leaps. Unfortunately, it is also a film with a script stocked full of tired plot retreads from better thrillers.

Do yourself a favor and just move on to the next block.

Starring Jennifer Lopez, Ryan Guzman, Kristin Chenoweth
Written by Barbara Curry
Directed by Rob Cohen

Aaron Peterson
The Hollywood Outsider