The Boy Next Door

By: Robert Murphy

You know those tragic stories that you hear about all the time, a husband who lets it slip and starts seeing his young hot receptionist and his wife eventually finds out and they get a divorce. For whatever idiotic reason the husband in The Boy Next Door does this to his amazingly smokey wife, Claire Peterson (Jennifer Lopez), a local high school teacher and now single parent to her son, Kevin (Ian Nelson). Despite her outward appearance, she spends most of her nights alone in scantily revealing t-shirts and reading classic literature, hoping that things would turn around for her and her husband, Garret (John Corbett), who is trying to get back in on his former life with her and his son. But, a monkey wrench gets thrown into the equation when the new hunky neighbor boy comes into the picture, fixing her garage door *wink wink* and showing an interest in the suburban widow. 

The plot to The Boy Next Door plays out like your average Lifetime movie where the woman has suffered a tough divorce and then a swarthy hunk comes in to make it all better. The more unbelievable aspect to this story is that Jennifer Lopez is the woman who was cheated on in the first place. Even at the age of 45, former pop singer J-Lo is still an incredible beauty on and off the screen and the fact that she was cheated on seems unlikely. What is even more unlikely is the idea that this single parent has the time to look the way she does every single day, you wouldn't believe that Claire is such a damaged woman that she gets into a skin tight dress and has her make-up done to perfection each day when the only people who would enjoy it are her students. The character looks as though she has a professional stylist on hand each and everyday while her wheezing teenaged son goes about his life trying to hit on the hot girl in class and her husband lingers in the background. 

What does make sense is the boy, for the most part anyways. The 19 year old Noah (Ryan Guzman) is a kind and well mannered kid, coming to town to take care of his doddering uncle who is going through bone marrow surgery. His attraction for Claire seems like an innocent crush and in all honesty, it makes complete sense to be attracted to a mom like this. What isn't so believable is this boys interest in classical literature as well, he quotes famous poems by Homer in The Iliad that makes an awkward scene between himself and Claire while her son and Claire's best friend look on with dumbstruck eyes. Their response is perhaps the correct one especially from her son who is not too much younger than Noah, what kid this built is a scholar and quotes Greek tragedies? It's clear that the Greek angle was meant to be relevant to the situation to come after a moment of weakness and Noah's flattery gets the better of Claire and they hook up. 

This scene is exceedingly racy, it does not show any key details on Jennifer Lopez's body but it does reveal a good deal of skin and Noah reaching down into a lacy forbidden zone. It's clear where the R-rating comes from afterwards and despite the sneering it may get me, it is the only scene in the movie that is worth while. From here though things begin to spiral, Claire is ashamed and tries to let Noah down easy and that does not sit too well with him as he thought it was a stepping stone to more. Things mysteriously start going wrong and then Noah begins to get exceedingly vindictive and aggressive with his approach towards getting Claire back. This opens up the actually issues with Noah besides his scholarly life style, his anger and manipulative nature are far too unbelievable, Guzman's performance felt very forced and he never comes off as half as scary as he is meant to. His toying with Claire's son also seems far too out of Guzman's range to pull off with his boyish looks. 

In the end, Claire never does the one thing that she should have done as soon as Noah starts harshly behaving and that is going to the police. Not only Claire but everyone else should have done this too, especially after Noah bashes a kids skull completely into a school locker over and over again but only gets a suspension of all things. The only moment that warrants any reaction is the steamy scene half way through because it is the only part that feels real, the rest is frankly an exercise in futility. Jennifer Lopez never feels like the lonely housewife, weak and wanting her family back together and Noah is never the scary mastermind he is made out to be either. 

Good:

- The saucy scene between Lopez and Guzman

- The sexual innuendo hidden throughout

Bad:

- Lopez's and Guzman's unrealistic portrayal of their characters

- Riddled with cliches and moments you have seen hundreds of times before

- You can predict what will happen in this movie every step of the way

Scully Rating: 3.0 out of 10