I was pretty excited for this movie since the plot summary about a suburban family worried that their reclusive and mysterious neighbors might be a cannibalistic cult sounded intriguing. However, what really resulted was just a comedic mess of overzealous and overly excited characters, corny and annoying acting and a slow-moving story.
Because of the forced humor that succumbed most of the movie, any suspense and thrills of the mysterious-neighbor plot device was lost. Rick Ducommun was one of the nosy suburbanites and created much of the annoyance and damage to the course of events, as did the childish, clownish and ridiculous Bruce Dern. Corey Feldman tried to pull off a bad boyish teenager look, who really didn't do anything in the film, and Tom Hanks acted like he was overly frustrated much of the time during the movie. I actually thought the mysterious neighbor characters had the best acting and chemistry.
There may be a tidbit of thrilling moments in and there, for example, the part where Tom Hanks sneaks into the neighbors' house at night to try to find incriminating evidence. But, don't let the horror genre label fool you - this movie is just a poor attempt at black comedy that even kids won't find funny.
Grade D---
Because of the forced humor that succumbed most of the movie, any suspense and thrills of the mysterious-neighbor plot device was lost. Rick Ducommun was one of the nosy suburbanites and created much of the annoyance and damage to the course of events, as did the childish, clownish and ridiculous Bruce Dern. Corey Feldman tried to pull off a bad boyish teenager look, who really didn't do anything in the film, and Tom Hanks acted like he was overly frustrated much of the time during the movie. I actually thought the mysterious neighbor characters had the best acting and chemistry.
There may be a tidbit of thrilling moments in and there, for example, the part where Tom Hanks sneaks into the neighbors' house at night to try to find incriminating evidence. But, don't let the horror genre label fool you - this movie is just a poor attempt at black comedy that even kids won't find funny.
Grade D---