The story builds up very, very slowly. Too slowly, in fact, that there are sighs of relief when the culmination is finally reached. LaBute really takes his time building up the characters, which is a plus; but the downside is that these tiny steps in progression may not be able to keep the audience’s attention.
Furthermore, the trailer has clearly showed what this movie is all about but the producers decided to use up more than an hour to show the tension build-ups which clearly is unnecessary.
The main focus here is on L. Jackson. There are moments of brilliance in his acting when the glee creeps out slowly from inside of him as he orchestrates and watches his neighbour’s predicaments. But then there are also moments of ridicule, like when his eyes are overacting with exaggerated popping and narrowing.
However, LaBute manages to capture the human emotions well when faced with these unfriendly encounters and confrontations. And with competent actors like Patrick Wilson, Kerry Washington, and together with L. Jackson; the performance level compensated somewhat for a general lack of direction of the movie.
Another subject the movie tries to intelligently touch on is the interracial relationships and the difficulties that come with it. But we are already in the 21st century and topics like this one would have been more welcomed perhaps a decade ago as it feels more than irrelevant now.
Misguided as it is, this is another Samuel L Jackson movie that’s more than likely to be forgotten by next month.
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