The Boy Next Door
Universal Pictures | Release Date: January 23, 2015 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
30
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 33 Critic Reviews
Positive:
2
Mixed:
10
Negative:
21
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
67
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyJan 21, 2015
Plenty of credit is due to Barbara Curry’s deranged script, set in a suburban fantasyland of doofus bullies, junior proms, and middle-class sex fears; it probably isn’t meant to be a Verhoeven satire, but it sure moves like one. Read full review
63
USA TodayClaudia PuigJan 22, 2015
Predictable and foolishly unsuspecting characters react in ways that make you want to shake them. But there's an undeniable sense of silly fun in this erotic thriller. Read full review
60
Village VoiceAlan ScherstuhlJan 20, 2015
The movie's not built for belief. It's built for dumb, shivery, sexed-up pleasure, and it delivers, albeit somewhat modestly. Read full review
58
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattJan 21, 2015
Boy's premise reeks of stalker-movie mothballs, and it's too timid to fully dive into the high camp it hints at. Instead, this cookie just crumbles. Read full review
50
Boston GlobePeter KeoughJan 22, 2015
It will also make them laugh. Intentionally or not, director Rob Cohen (“Alex Cross”) has put together the most hilarious camp classic since “White House Down” (2013). Read full review
50
St. Louis Post-DispatchKevin C. JohnsonJan 22, 2015
It’s unashamedly of the B-movie variety — a quick and easy time-killer. Read full review
50
The DissolveNathan RabinJan 22, 2015
For those seeking guilty laughs and shameless camp, The Boy Next Door is the exact right kind of bad movie. It’s full of unintentional laughs, and transcendently unselfconscious. Read full review
40
The TelegraphTim RobeyFeb 26, 2015
The film goes for broke with such a careening lack of inhibition, it definitely ends up in the fun zone. Read full review
40
Time Out LondonTom HuddlestonFeb 23, 2015
Props to director Rob Cohen for making a gender-flipped 'Fatal Attraction’. But The Boy Next Door really should be a lot juicier. Read full review
40
The New York TimesNicolas RapoldJan 22, 2015
Mr. Cohen, no stranger to delivering pulp product, employs visual clichés as if they were flash cards; no exposed thigh or made-you-jump reveal goes unexploited. Read full review
40
Arizona RepublicRandy CordovaJan 22, 2015
It's no surprise The Boy Next Door is junk. What is disappointing is that it's not fun junk. It doesn't even merit a good hate-watching, because the whole thing is so meh. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterSheri LindenJan 21, 2015
It offers January moviegoers some guilty-pleasure thrills and laughs, while falling way short of its potential on both the dramatic and the camp fronts. Read full review
38
RogerEbert.comChristy LemireJan 23, 2015
The Boy Next Door has its share of so-bad-they’re-good moments – and details, and chunks of dialogue – but not nearly enough. Mostly, they’re just bad. And it had such potential too, starting with the casting. Read full review
38
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJan 22, 2015
I wish The Boy Next Door were a different, zingier sort of mediocrity, but whenever it threatens to go the full Zalman King "Two Moon Junction" route, it pulls back and behaves itself and settles for a grindingly predictable series of escalations. Read full review
38
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezJan 22, 2015
The film is so gleefully ridiculous that you start to suspect the filmmakers were in on the joke and forgot to tell the actors. Read full review
38
Movie NationRoger MooreJan 21, 2015
Lopez is a gorgeous woman with the same mousy voice she came into the movies with 20 years ago. She’s all about the makeup, the hair, the clothes. She plays the part like someone imitating a TV teacher, from her classroom posture to her delivery. Read full review
37
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanJan 22, 2015
The Boy Next Door plays best as unintentional comedy. Read full review
30
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleJan 22, 2015
Breathless, uninspired January junk that feels like the iffiest bits of a Lifetime movie and late-night cable schlock slapped together. (And not erotically.) Read full review
30
Austin ChronicleSteve DavisJan 21, 2015
While Lopez carries off the overdone damsel-in-distress schtick somewhat credibly, Guzman fails to step up to the trickier role of her seducer and stalker. Read full review
30
TheWrapInkoo KangJan 21, 2015
Neither good nor bad, nor campy nor scary enough to be in any way memorable, The Boy Next Door is a lot like our own neighbors, just there. You could make the effort to sneak a peek, but it probably wouldn’t be worth your while. Read full review
30
VarietyAndrew BarkerJan 21, 2015
The film’s initial formulaic competence gives way to outright preposterousness rather quickly, hinging on idiot-plot character motivations. Read full review
25
Philadelphia InquirerDavid HiltbrandFeb 2, 2015
The Boy Next Door aspires to be a cautionary tale, but it unspools like an infomercial - with a shockingly gory ending. Read full review
25
ObserverRex ReedJan 28, 2015
B-movie director Rob Cohen (The Fast and the Furious) hasn’t got a clue what to do with so much preposterous pulp fiction, so he wafts between sexy potboiler and psychological thriller with an uneasy lack of grace that brings out the worst in everybody. Read full review
25
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJan 23, 2015
It's badly directed, poorly edited, and features some of the most unconvincing acting this side of a soup commercial. Read full review
25
Portland OregonianMarc MohanJan 23, 2015
It's a thriller, if the term can be applied to an inept, perfunctory movie with more laughs than thrills — and it only has a couple laughs. Let's call it an attempted thriller and an inadvertent comedy. Read full review
25
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJan 22, 2015
Everyone in The Boy Next Door has to behave like an idiot at least once or twice, just so the movie can keep going. It’s an act of mercy when it finally grinds to a halt. Read full review
25
San Francisco ChronicleThomas LeeJan 22, 2015
Why Lopez decided to do this inept, cliche-infested film is anyone’s guess. She may be an actress of limited range, but her work includes solid movies like “Selena” and “Out of Sight.” Unfortunately, Lopez’s resume now includes this stinker. And we’re all the dumber for it. Read full review
25
New York PostLou LumenickJan 22, 2015
Unintended laughs far, far outnumber intended thrills. Read full review
20
CineVueJulia AlexanderFeb 26, 2015
The sub-par acting, overdramatic cinematography and horribly predictable shock value of the film makes it all the more difficult to sit through without laughing at the ludicrous production or checking a cellphone to gauge how much torture one is expected to sit through before it finally ends. Read full review
20
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierJan 22, 2015
It’s Fatal Attraction 101. Read full review
12
Slant MagazineEd GonzalezJan 21, 2015
The camera regards Guzman's buttocks and Lopez's breasts with an evasion of visual pleasure that could be blamed on the actors' nudity clauses if the entirety of the film didn't resemble a Lifetime movie embarrassed to have found its way to theaters. Read full review
0
The PlaylistDrew TaylorJan 22, 2015
The entire movie feels like a warning for women of any age: if you act on your desires, you will be punished. And there seems to be no greater punishment than having to watch The Boy Next Door. Read full review
0
The PlaylistDrew TaylorJan 22, 2015
A limp psychosexual thriller that takes a promisingly trashy conceit... and does absolutely nothing with it, and saddles it with wooden performances, poor staging, and a complete lack of conviction. It reaches a nearly operatic level of ineptitude. Read full review
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