To start this off, don’t see this movie, it’s bad. It’s not funny bad (like Taken 3), it’s not Nic Cage bad (I’m a Nic Cage hipster. I liked him first) it’s just “fuck I’m not getting that money back” bad. This movie may seem like an easy target, but Vanity Fair is telling people to see it, so now it’s fair game. The list of issues with this movie runs long: shitty dialogue, horribly unoriginal plot, bad acting, and attempting to be three Greek tragedies crammed into one movie, but for this review I’m going to focus on writer Barbara Curry and director Robert Cohen’s half baked attempt at a feminist thriller, and how Jennifer Lopez (who will now be referred to in this piece as “J-Lo”, not to be confused with “J-Law” who can act) absolutely hijacked it.
This film was shot in 25 days…that’s it. I dug deeper into the cast and crew to see who would allow this crap to happen, and what I turned up was surprising. According to IMDb, Barbara Curry, the writer, is a pretty impressive person:
Barbara Curry holds a J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law and an MFA in Screenwriting from UCLA. She was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in downtown Los Angeles for nearly a decade, working in the Major Violent Crimes Unit on federal cases that included murder-for-hire, prison murder, racketeering, arson, kidnapping, and bank robbery. She has taught criminal procedure at FBI Headquarters in Quantico, VA, and advanced trial advocacy at the U.S Justice Department in Washington, D.C.
Director Rob Cohen is decidedly less impressive. He’s the man behind such quality movies as xXx, The Fast and the Furious, and Alex Cross…remember all the strong female characters in The Fast and the Furious movies?
With Rob Cohen’s track record, the attempt to make this a thriller that respects women must come from the writer, Curry (or J-Lo, which I’ll touch on later) clearly wanted to experiment with the tired genre of thrillers. The Boy Next Door is her first writing credit, so I can give her some leeway in her issues with exposition, dialogue, pacing, foreshadowing, character depth, plot structure…ok maybe not, she’s a bad writer. She isn’t wrong to address the issue, because there definitely is one. Horrors/Thrillers have always treated women like shit, they’re either psychos, stalkers, or the endless rabble of slutty teen victims. I respect Curry for attempting to make a thriller that is centered around a strong female character and having the man be a stalking, obsessive antagonist. There’s one glaring problem though, Curry commits the same generalizing and typecasting of men as the rest of the genre does to women. The only sympathetic male character is J-Lo’s son, Kevin (who inexplicably inherited none of her Hispanic traits) who is a generic nerdy, wimpy, pushover who is mortally terrified of people with vaginas (known to some as “women”). A character’s threat level is measured by how masculine they are, not their intentions or character flaws.
Here’s what I mean. There’s a portion of the movie where Ryan Guzman’s character Noah (who from now on will be referred to as “Sex Object” or “Magic Mike”) corrupts the spawn of J-Lo by “being his friend”. How does he go about corrupting him? He makes him a dirty man. Or in other words, he makes him masculine, which for some reason these days is synonymous with controlling and evil (I’m aware that I am violently speaking in absolutes, I’m trying to make a point.). He teaches him how to fix things, shoot guns, and punch inanimate objects. OH LORD HE’S GONE TO THE DARK SIDE. A moment where the viewer is supposed to be concerned is when Kevin announces at the dinner table that he’s dropped his computer class for a boxing class (what the hell kind of school has a boxing class?). As dumb as boxing class may be, the film still shouldn’t imply that releasing aggression and building testosterone are “bad” activities. If any character’s balls are in need of a growth spurt, it’s Kevin’s. So what does Kevin gain in return from this corruption into manliness? He confronts his shit-heel midlife crisis dad, stands up to his bullies, and he gains the self confidence to ask out “the most beautiful girl in the school” (also, Kevin refers to her as this twice in the movie, never by her name. She doesn’t have a name. I believe that is OBJECTIFYING women, HMMMM?) so it seems like he’s actually grown up a bit because of Sex Object’s masculine influence on him. So how does the movie explicitly impart to the viewer that the innocent Kevin is being corrupted with masculinity? During this process of building self confidence and gaining desperately needed spine, Kevin starts very aggressively hitting a punching bag. Cool, he’s letting off some steam in a constructive fashion. No, but WAIT, boxing is testosterone fueled idiocy in it’s purest form that can’t be allowed to be constructive! So, Kevin has an allergic reaction for no good reason and almost dies. The only logical explanation is that he is allergic to aggression.
So EVERY male character in this movie is an asshole in some form. Magic Mike’s insane, the husband’s a cheater, Kevin starts confronting his asshole father in not very nice tones, but perhaps the king of the assholes is the shitty date that leads J-Lo right into the arms of her Sex Object. What follows is the actual dialogue in this scene, which is this man’s first reaction to hearing about J-Lo’s profession is to berate it. The next lines he spouts are so ridiculously misogynistic that it defies reality. Have you met anyone that would be this dickish to someone they’re meeting for the first time?
Man: “You’re a firecracker”
J-Lo: “What you don’t like a woman with a strong opinion?”
Man: “I don’t when it disagrees with mine.”
“Man” in this case is this guy:
These are the male characters you get in this movie.
Sex Object/Magic Mike: A sex-crazed psychopathic 19 year-old (is anyone buying that?) whose J-Lo centered libido overrides any and all logic and reason. SPOILER ALERT (if you still see this movie after this it’s your fault) He killed his dad for cheating on his mom who later commits suicide. And he had some sort of weird thing with his mom. Because basic Freudian psychology is never used in movies… So his love for J-Lo turns out to be some weird, barely fleshed out Oedipus complex… Also, he and J-Lo share a love for the Iliad and he is supposed to be like Achilles or something… because he fights and is hot and takes what he wants. One character can’t represent both Oedipus AND Achilles! It makes no sense! Stop adding in Greek bullshit in an attempt to make films artsy and smart! IT DOESN’T WORK ANYMORE!
J-Lo’s Ex but not: A man who cheated on her with his secretary. Literally the most cliched cheating husband trope of all time. When they have their “relationship repairing” moment he ruins it by getting all grabby and trying to have sex with J-Lo (this is the “Booty” music video of movies). Dat big ass is grabbed many a times with many a close ups.
The charming fellow in the previous picture: A blind date set up by J-Lo’s friend. He asks J-Lo her profession, then instantly starts talking shit about it. That is his entire character.
Ginger Skateboarder: Bullies who pick on J-Lo’s son for peeing his pants during an allergic reaction (See Angry Side Note at end of article).
Kevin: Effeminate computer geek who is corrupted by his new masculine neighbor into becoming an argumentative rebel who punches things.
All of these characters are stereotypes. I’m fully aware of the rich history of teen slashers and horror movies that cast women as obsessive, manipulative, or oblivious, but the solution to fixing the problem of offensive gender roles isn’t turning the tables on the other gender.Even with the terrible male representation, the movie still has a much deeper issue: J-Lo
Curry’s attempt at bringing gender equality to the thriller genre is ultimately undermined by the ego of their star, J-Lo. Feminism is defined as a mission to seek equality between the sexes. One of the biggest barriers to equality is the sexual objectification of women, sexual objectification of men happens, but the sexual objectification of women happens exponentially more… watch any music video, TV show, or professional sports event. I will be the one to point out the elephant in the room (by elephant I mean J-Lo’s ego… and dat ass… oh dat ass): J-Lo’s entire purpose in making this movie was to sexually objectify herself. At the surface the plot of this movie is this: a young man sleeps with J-Lo and becomes so obsessed with her that he can’t handle life without her. That’s right. This low budget thriller serves as a vehicle for J-Lo to prove that she’s still attractive and that even the most attractive men obsess over her. She can’t act or sing, but dammit she’s still hot enough to be the lead of an “erotic thriller”!
Seriously, in every shot of this movie Lopez is wearing something very form fitting or see through. She and Sex Object exchange long, lusty glances for the first half an hour of the movie. When the big, soft core porn, sex scene happens, the money shot is Magic Mike unloading a gushy load of J-Lo ego goo all over the audience’s collective face. “You are so beautiful, you look so perfect right now, you deserve to be loved, God you’re so beautiful, you’re so perfect” are just a few examples. Those are lines, and they all occur within minutes of each other. It’s almost as if the movie isn’t about the issue of Sex Object’s obsession with J-Lo, it’s about the fact that J-Lo is so overwhelmingly attractive that Sex Object couldn’t help becoming obsessed with her. There are only two other female characters in this movie, her friend “Vicki” played by ,Kristin Chenoweth, who’s normally an attractive lady, but she’s wearing clothes meant for a way younger women, and has overdone makeup that almost makes her look intentionally ugly. Even “the most beautiful girl in school” is played down, she’s never dressed to impress and was probably cast for the specific reason of being slightly less attractive than J-Lo. All of the other women are secondary to J-Lo and all of the men’s lives revolve around her. In this movie, she is the center of the universe.
There is also the issue of the sex scene itself. The definition of consent has been a huge issue around the country and this movie (and Fifty Shades of Grey in the near future) do nothing to help the discussion. With the “Yes means Yes” policy becoming a well reasoned standard for consent laws, this movie is conspicuously absent of that moment of consent. J-Lo never says “yes” to Magic Mike, in fact she says “no” several times. Instead of forcefully ending the encounter, it just gets all steamy and sensual and she “gives in” to him. The movie didn’t bother to establish whether or not she was under the influence of alcohol, it just barrels right in to the scene everyone came to see of attractive people pretending to rub their naughty bits together.
To further deepen the creepy ambiguity, J-Lo might be a child molester. The movie skirts past this by a convenient plot device that turns the 27 year old Guzman into a 19 year old high school senior (that’s a keeper J-Lo). With all of the other issues with this movie, I almost forgot to consider that I can’t tell who is raping who, and that’s a disturbing line of thought to jump into.
The writer of The Boy Next Door wanted to toy with the notion of gender roles in thrillers, the director of The Boy Next Door is a moron, and the star’s ego consumed the entire project. What was written as a story about a strong woman overcoming an obsessive man was transformed into a vehicle for an aging star to prove to people that she’s still got it. If you’re as hot as J-Lo and want to make a movie to brag about it, be my guest. Sell your self sex symbol, show off those perfect genes. But don’t use a movie that is filled with anti-men, feminist bullshit as your vehicle to do so. You can’t mix the two. It makes no sense. I enjoy bad movies because I find them funny, this movie, however, was just pathetic.
ANGRY SIDE NOTE
The nerdy child, Kevin, naturally has allergies. The reason he’s picked on by the bullies at school is because he peed his pants during an allergic reaction. J-Lo specifies that this was caused by a bee sting. In another scene, he somehow has an allergic reaction while aggressively boxing. Magic Mike stabs him with an Epipen and he is magically cured. As another nerd with allergies, this portrayal was horribly inaccurate. First off, how in the hell does one pee their pants during a reaction? Your body is a little busy trying to choke you to death. This movie clearly did no research on how allergies work, they are tied to food, an airborne pollen, or a certain material, YOU CANNOT HAVE AN ALLERGIC REACTION FROM BEING ANGRY. We get that you hate dominance, and aggression, and all other evil macho traits, but you don’t need to make characters physically allergic to them! Also, an Epipen doesn’t end an allergic reaction, it simply delays it, Kevin should have been taken to the hospital. He was not. The kid would have died. But at least he wouldn’t have lived to see the ending of the movie. Fuck it, go see this movie… just for the ending…. that beautifully bad ending.
The Daily Heresy 
Dat ass doe!
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Even women don’t want to see this movie.
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