User Reviews

"The Good Neighbor" follows the antics of 2 teenage boys (Ethan and Sean) 'haunting' and surveilling an old man (Harold Grainey) that they dislike, all in the name of conducting a 'sociological experiment', in the hopes of generating a million views on youtube. Eventually, we learn that this just isn't some innocent experiment, and the old man isn't what they thought he was.

The movie opens with a narration of how perception isn't always reality, and that people see only what they want to see. And this is really what this movie is about. The old man that everybody views as despicable and hateful is really just an old man that's hurting from the loss of his wife and wants to be left alone. While the old man's strange behavior may seem psychotic to others, especially to the two voyeur teenagers, in reality it's just the actions of an old man trying to deal with pain and reacting to the paranormal activity, in his own self-destructive way of course. It's an interesting lesson of how outside influences, regardless of how innocent, can have an enormously unpredictable outcome.

However, the antics of these kids isn't so innocent, most especially are the motives of Ethan. He keeps trying to push the old man, even when confronted and challenged by his partner in crime. We soon learn that this 'experiment' has as much to do with revenge as it does a study in human behavior. We learn that there is a history between Ethan's family and Mr. Grainey (very appropriately named I might add), and Ethan's bias toward the old man only fuels his speculation that he is up to no good. Ultimately, Mr. Grainey pays the ultimate price as a result of the actions of the two juvenile delinquents.

I generally found this movie kind of hard to watch because the characters were so unlikable. Ethan, the true villain in this movie, I found to be truly despicable. His cohort Sean has a conscience but isn't able to think on his own and is compelled to be around Ethan because of his own insecurities and social awkwardness. Ethan's mother is so wrapped up in her own world that she basically lets Ethan do whatever he wants. And Mr. Grainey, for better or worse, was made out to be so horrible by the narrative that even when we learn that he's a lonely, albeit mean, old man that garners sympathy, it's hard to put aside the initial feelings about him and his overall bad traits.

However, the climax with Ethan hiding in the house with his gun drawn and Mr. Grainey standing in the same room with his gun drawn is truly a gripping scene, and basically saves the movie from being a total disaster. And it serves as a reminder to us all that we all live in our own perceptions of reality.

For the most part of this movie, I struggled to actually like the two kids, their characters were very unlikeable.

One seemed to possess more empathy than the other though!

The sentence that these two cruel people got for their actions and what they caused a lonely old man to do, was just pitiful.

They willingly tortured this man, no one made them. They did it for their own self gain.

I literally cried when the old man shot himself, cause I knew that it was in relation to that bell and that it meant something regarding his late Wife, before the movie even explained what the bell meant.

How two people could be okay with the cruel torture of an old man who just wanted to be left alone, is beyond me.

A large portion of this movie is pretty boring, from a movie perspective to be honest, I watched it to the end as I was curious how it all ended up in court. I actually thought that it would have been Ethan who shot him (given he took a gun) with him having such a hate for him, had it in his head that this old guy was just bad, even knowing he'd helped his own Mother all those years ago.

But I knew when Grainey had the gun and looked at the bell, what he was going to do.

It's a very sad end to a torturous movie.

It's not all boring as such, but not much happens in it really.

I can't recommend this movie, not because it isn't good, because I wouldn't sit through it again, as I'd struggle to again watch an old man be cruely taunted by two kids.

Two young actors are irritating and caan barely says two words the lighting is all dark and not a lot happens... ending was disappointing too.. I only watched on In the hope the boys would get their comeuppance.. Wouldn't recommend

*** Spoilers

It's really too bad James Caan's talent was totally wasted in this movie. The main characters are so absolutely annoying. I watched this movie on Netflix, the caption was the kids spying on Caan would get a comeuppance but it never happened. I kept waiting and waiting and wanted to give up on this movie but was waiting for Caan to show these kids up but nothing. The ending was totally dissatisfying. This movie reminded me of the tragedy at Rutgers University where the gay college student killed himself and the kids responsible got a slap on the wrist. Perhaps this was what the writer(s) wanted but it was just very dissatisfying. These kids were murderers and got away with it.

The cast is very good and it plays well.

The courtroom parts sprinted through are weak and feel out of place. I think it's pretty obvious from the get-go that this experiment will go south. Plus, the courtroom parts aren't played well.

It gets insanely brutal when you realize what the old man is going through and what the boys are doing to him. It's quite heart breaking, and it's really the meat here. It's very sad but it does feel really real which makes it worse.

Really?

This movie is a complete waste of time. The premise sounded interesting, but the plot leaves you utterly unsatisfied. The so-much-wished-and hoped-for twist, like e.g. the "good neighbor" himself turning into the prankster or something of the like, it never comes.

Instead, we get

• a foreseeable plot, no real twists;

• boredom to the extreme, with endless pointless conversations between typical 2016 teenage boys;

• extremely, and I mean EXTREMELY unlikable lead characters, i.e. said boys;

• hours of utter stupidity: Main character carries a gun when entering the neighbor's house to fix a camera... I mean, really;

• most annoying of all: A movie that only for a very short amount of time takes advantage of the entire screen estate; mostly we see a small box with black stripes not only at top and bottom, no, but also left and right. OK, we get it, it's the image of a camera, but wouldn't the text on the screen suffice to explain that?!

• a fantastic James Caan, who does his best to save this wreck from sinking - albeit unsuccessfully.

A real confirmation for my feeling that movies from around 2005 and later with high probability suck, despite the names on the cast lists.

This is a plodding movie. I thought about quitting it several times. It had a feel of a low-budget flick that could go no where at times. But, it had James Caan. Caan brings something, in my experience, to every role I've seen him in over the years. I think he was the reason I stayed with it.

Two teens with too much down time to which one is a off-center progenitor of the other who is the super nerdy rich type. It's that kind of combination that might spawn the next Apple or Charles Manson cult. Starting out in a kind of ignorant blind prank mode the two agree to pick on an old curmudgeon neighbor by wiring his house with audio and video bugs and throwing in some electronic disrupting devices for good measure. The darker, but much more charismatic, of the two, Ethan, wants to make a movie of an old man thinking he's being haunted by a poltergeist. The more vexed and nerdy one, Sean, gets reluctantly on-board. Ethan keeps pushing Sean to a more uncomfortable level as he sells the old man as being some kind of a monster who is up to something nefarious. As the movie progresses the emptiness, and the dark core, of Ethan begins to slowly come out.

As mentioned there were times I thought the movie plodded along so slowly, perhaps, I should give up. I mean James Caan's dialog in the whole affair was, maybe, ten sentences. But, Caan brings something to a role that I just want to watch. His Grainey character was a model of restraint making the man all the more mysterious. It was clear while he wasn't speaking volumes there were wheels spinning out inside of the man. It all culminates in a way I really didn't predict and looking at the character who is struggling at the end of a long journey it resonated. It put the two youths in perspective too with one being truly dangerous in the guise of cute smart ass with the other being the ultimate awkward follower. While this movie is only marginally good, it's better in it's the final sum which explores how sinister, even seemingly innocuous, choices can create a truly horrific outcome. There's a wanton smile right at the end that sums it all up amazingly well.

This review contains SPOILERS but it doesn't matter because you shouldn't waste your time seeing this anyway, LOL.

Just when you thought the found footage genre couldn't get lower, we get "The Good Neighbor"--a micro-budget film about an old man being stalked by his teenage neighbors who illegally spy on him with cameras and try to convince him that his house is haunted. The premise sounds okay, I suppose, but unfortunately this movie is so boring you'll wish it had more scenes of "The Good Neighbor" snoozing in his chair.

Why is this crap called The Good Neighbor? It isn't about the old man being a good neighbor or a bad neighbor or any kind of neighbor at all. It's about some spoiled brats tormenting him with video surveillance and creating a fake haunting to create a documentary that, even if it was completed, would have been so illegal that they'd never be able to release it to anyone. What a plot. Why not call it "The Bad Neighbors"?

Let's get straight to the chase. The acting is horrible. And I mean horrible, like first year acting school horrible. The writing is also horrible. These kids who live next door to this old man supposedly have all this technology to create the illusion that the old man's house is haunted, but they do nothing with it. Sure, a screen door slams (did they install a motor to it?), and the lights flicker, and the radio goes on and off, and, well, that's about it. Wouldn't this have been a gem if they took it to the limit and actually made furniture move around ala Poltergeist (as they suggested they could do) or even project holograms of ghosts or some other crazy stuff? Wouldn't that turn into something mind boggling? But no. Instead, they turn the heat off on the poor old man and shatter his window. Lucky he didn't die of pneumonia! Good job.

James Caan is great here and that's why I'm giving this crap fest a two instead of a zero. Please don't tell me this is James Caan's "comeback role". He's 76 years old and has had a distinguished career and doesn't need any "comeback". Here he does his best Michael Caine impersonation and it's actually solid work. Too bad it is lost in this drivel of a film, that's not about him but rather about beer swigging teenagers who could use a good spanking. I'm just going to assume someone involved in this mess was James Caan's great grandson or something so that I don't keep wondering why he agreed to be part of this garbage.

And the plot. Uggh. Apparently there's only one cop in this town because every time something happens, just this one cop shows up. And he's a stereotype. As is the Asian prosecuting attorney. As is the judge. As is the big crowd of people and media mob outside the courtroom after the trial, a trial that involves the death of some loner old man that nobody cared about before he died yet suddenly the entire world seems to be on the courtroom steps in support of him. LOL. As are the titles to the chapters as if this two penny film is as important as some big budget Quentin Tarantino epic.

This movie might have been saved with some final surprise: like the corpse of the boy's father rising up through the old man's basement floor or something similar to the end of Friday the 13th or Carrie. But no. They were too lazy to even think up an ending. Instead we get a long shot of the snotty nosed little brat who orchestrated the entire thing standing on the court room steps as he's surrounded by a stereotypical mob consisting of, and I'm not kidding, someone from every ethnic background on the planet. I can't even go on, lol. I think you get the picture. Two stars. Probably the worst movie I've seen this year.