The Girl Next Door

Directed by Luke Greenfield, The Girl Next Door follows a studious high schooler (Emile Hirsch’s Matthew Kidman) as he finds himself falling for his beautiful new next-door neighbor (Elisha Cuthbert’s Danielle) – with complications ensuing after Danielle’s past, primarily in the guise of Timothy Olyphant’s sketchy Kelly, catches up with her. It’s a fun premise that’s employed to slightly uneven yet mostly satisfying effect by Greenfield, as the filmmaker, armed with a script by Stuart Blumberg, David T. Wagner, and Brent Goldberg, delivers a briskly-paced comedy that benefits from its assortment of agreeable performances – with Hirsch and Cuthbert’s winning work here certainly matched by top-notch periphery performers as James Remar, Paul Dano, and Chris Marquette. (There’s never any doubt, however, that Olyphant’s magnetic, scene-stealing turn remains an obvious highlight from start to finish.) And while the 108 minute running time does pave the way for a few lulls, The Girl Next Door, which boasts at its core a central couple oozing chemistry, primarily comes off as an affable comedy that hits far more often than it misses.

*** out of ****