Far from Perfect
When Jessica Michael's (Linda Purl - Stalked at 17) last tenant dies she quickly finds herself with a new one in the form of Brian Hartwell (Maxwell Caulfield - Empire Records) who appears to be the perfect tenant as he couldn't be nicer if he tried. Whilst Jessica quickly warms to Brian her daughter, Laura (Stacy Hogue), is immediately suspicious, especially as a week before Brian showed up she saw him sitting in a car just down from their house. What neither Jessica nor Laura know is that Brian is in fact Danny Summer who ever since he was a young child and found his father hanging from the rafters on Christmas Eve has been plotting his revenge.
Let me tell you right away that within 10 minutes of "The Perfect Tenant" starting you know 95% of the movie having seen Danny find his father hanging by the Christmas tree to Brian being dangerous and it doesn't take a genius to put two and two together. The other 5% comes from what connects Jessica to his father's suicide and why does Brian have a friend who clearly has spent some time in a psychiatric hospital. The question is? Is this mystery enough to keep "The Perfect Tenant" entertaining from start to its predictable finish, and the answer simply comes down to your familiarity with this sort of movie because if you recognize the set up the rest of the movie isn't going to enthral you.
In fact "The Perfect Tenant" is one of those movies which if you are rolling your eyes at the familiarity then they are going to be permanently staring at the inside of your head thanks to a series of stupid scenes and the stupid things which characters in this both say and do. Let me say that you will never let an old guy blow out all his candles on a birthday cake after seeing what happened to Jessica's dad in one scene. In all honesty I can't remember the last time I watched what was technically a thriller which is full of so much dumb stuff and the sort of over the top acting which goes hand in hand with it.
What this all boils down to is that "The Perfect Tenant" is many things from being a predictable thriller to being full of dumb scenes. But whilst a poor movie it does come close to being entertaining for all the wrong reasons.
