The Perfect Guy (2015)

Directed by David M. Rosenthal

Contains spoilers.

Bad movies are just bad. There is no redeeming factor that can make up for any of the badness because everything that went into making the movie, from the writing, to the directing, and the acting and production, are all just bad. And that is the story of The Perfect Guy.

Leah Vaughn (Sanaa Lathan) has a great life as a lobbyist but after a revealing night, where her boyfriend David King (Morris Chestnut) emphasizes his unease with marriage and having children, she ends her relationship with Dave. Two months later, she runs into Carter Duncan (an avid Dominic Toretto fan played by Michael Ealy) and they hit if off. Carter is handsome, charming, charismatic, funny, smart with a good job, and seems to always know the right things to say. Their relationship blossoms and Leah starts to fall for Carter. But one night, as Carter drives Leah home, they pull into a gas station; while Carter is at the counter to pay, a stranger comes up to the car and starts talking to Leah about the car and asking if she wouldn't mind if he takes a picture of it. Suddenly, Carter grabs him and tosses him away from the car, then gets on top of him and starts to punch him. The gas station attendant intervenes, and the couple drive away. Afterwards, Leah breaks up with Carter but the breakup doesn't dissuade him. Carter begins to stalk her, repeatedly confessing his love for her. This inspires Leah to seek police help, but they say there's nothing they can legally do. Leah soon gets back in touch with Dave, who wants to restart their relationship. Carter doesn't take kindly to this, and his stalking behavior intensifies.

The first half hour or so is like a bad rom-com, the middle hour is like a boring thriller, and the ending is like a bad action movie. The Perfect Guy is like a lonely mother's wet dream, with attractive, well-put-together guys all trying to claim her, to protect her, and threatening each other. The movie ends up being a jog through Clichéville with a brief stop on Predictable Street in Boringtown. The writing actually suffers from frequent bouts of... well... bad writing. The dialogue becomes a trope in and of itself and, as a thriller, The Perfect Guy brings nothing new to the genre.

The thriller aspect never even materializes because Rosenthal shows us every single thing that Carter does in his stalking efforts.

The romantic comedy part of the movie has such shiners as, "We just wanted different things," and, "I promised myself I wouldn't, but here I am," and "Does he have a brother?" It ends up being like three movies shoved into an hour and a half, with a condensed and utterly cliché rom-com, followed by a tripe, mystery-less thriller, and then turns Leah into a reluctant hero with a shotgun.

Completely plot-driven, none of the acting is convincing and the characters are simply annoying. All secondary characters are nothing more than blank and pointless additions that serve to move the plot along to the next thing, mostly just parroting things back so Leah can reply, informing the audience of her intentions.

The thriller aspect never even materializes because Rosenthal shows us every single thing that Carter does in his stalking efforts. The slow camera pans and predictable jump scares are expected and spoiled scenes, so the movie fails even to scare or suspend. Everything from Leah's friends loving Carter, to the police being unhelpful then acting as bad cop when they do help, to David's gifted watch being a clue, are all as predictable as what number comes after 1.

 

There is nothing about The Perfect Guy to redeem it from it mediocrity. Including too-loud music to explain every scene and tired photography to boot, Rosenthal has created a film as helplessly uninspired as low-brow spoof movies. I was left with a depressed and hopeless feeling following the movie, as if the film industry has reached a low point that it can never recover from.

 
 

TL;DR: An hour into the movie I googled whether or not I could get my money back if a movie's just bad. The Perfect Guy is slow, boring, and painfully tired, without any sense of originality or inspiration to set it apart from any movie, let alone the thriller genre. This last few weeks of terrible movies has been so hard... Pretty, pretty please... stop making bad movies.

  • Acting – 5 / 20
  • Story – 3 / 20
  • Cinematography – 4 / 20
  • Soundtrack – 0 / 10
  • Entertainment Factor – 3 / 10
  • Thriller – 3 / 10
  • Other – 0 / 10
 

Grade F = 18 / 100