Disturbia: Better Than I Expected

Disturbia is a teen styled remake of Alfred Hitchcock's 1954 classic thriller Rear Window. This modernization pits rising star Shia LeBeouf as the troubled teen against his suspicious neighbor, David Morse, in an easy to digest pop culture kind of way. The youthful cast keeps the energy flowing all the while edging on sexual tension which might leave you wondering if the bikini-clad neighbor is too young for you to be oogling.

Disturbia's storyline may or may not be a surprise to you, but either way you're likely to not have much trouble figuring out what's coming around each corner. While a few of the thrills are cheap and not likely to shock I still found this to be a rather satisfying movie.

The cast isn't too deep, nor does it need to be when your main character has a thousand foot radius. Shia LeBeouf turns in another solid performance in the lead role with plenty of wit and believable acting. Despite my dislike for his Transformers film I think we're going to continue to see more and more of this guy. David Morse as the villain does a surprisingly good job considering I'm used to seeing him play the nice guy. There isn't much for him to do other than be creepy and suspicious, both of which he covers well. It was nice to see Carrie-Anne Moss returning to the screen, though for some strange reason she doesn't levitate, run around on walls, or shoot guns at agents. The new faces for me were Sarah Roemer as the cute new girl and Aaron Yoo as LeBeouf's sidekick. Both were well cast, though I thought Yoo worked a little harder to entertain in his role.

At an hour and 45 minutes Disturbia won't keep you on the edge of your seat too long. Actually it never really got me to the edge, well maybe a little, but that's OK. It didn't feel like it wanted to push too hard on the ol' nerves and maybe that was because it was trying to restrain itself enough to hit the PG-13 rating. Think of this as a little more of a teen dramedy with some shocking moments. I ended up enjoying Disturbia more than I thought I would and wouldn't have a problem recommending it to you.