The Girl Next Door (2004) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski)

The Girl Next Door received some pretty solid levels of pre-release buzz on the internet, then quietly disappeared after grossing a modest $14 million. What went wrong?

The problem is that it is not a teenage sex comedy, as implied by the premise, which is that a clean-cut straight-A high school senior starts to get crazy when he falls in love with the porn star who moves in next door.

Could be raunchy fun, ala Porky's.

Could be gross humor, ala American Pie.

Isn't either.

 What is it? A formulaic romantic comedy about the relationship between a straight arrow kid and someone his own age who is in the world of adult sexual entertainment. The straight-laced guy gets drawn partially into her porn world to make a few bucks, ala Risky Business (Tom Cruise falls in love with hooker, turns his parents' house into a bordello), or maybe Night Shift (Henry Winkler falls in love with a hooker, turns the morgue into a pimping operation).

So what's wrong with that? People love romantic comedies, right? And Risky Business was a big hit that made Tom Cruise a major star.

True enough, but those who do like romantic comedies may not necessarily like this one.

Let me take you back to Risky Business for a minute, and draw a comparison by making some changes. Suppose Tom Cruise had been worked over a couple of times by thugs from the porno world. And I mean really worked over, until his face was a bloody pulp. Suppose he had been slipped Ecstasy and had to face his parents' world while stoned out of his gourd and still looking like he had just been beaten severely. Suppose his beloved hooker was on the edge of going back to her old life, and really couldn't seem to choose between the two. Suppose the hooker was filled with self-loathing about having been a hooker, yet was non-judgmental about the other people in the business. Suppose Cruise found himself getting a lap dance in a strip club - with one of his dad's best friends getting one in the adjoining chair. Suppose the creepy Alfred Molina guy from Boogie Nights presented a threat to the lives of Cruise and his girl unless they co-operated with him.

And there you have The Girl Next Door in a nutshell. It's Risky Business with moments of dark, ominous, and sometimes very ugly tone shifts, and at least two other elements which put a lot of emotional distance between the film and its audience:

1. Although the film eventually manages to produce the obligatory happy ending, there were moments when it seemed to be vying for the title of Most Heartbreaking Coming-of-Age Film since The Last American Virgin.

2. Not only is the porn star in this film filled with self-loathing, but she is not an entirely sympathetic character. As Roger Ebert wrote in a scathing review:

Danielle (Elisha Cuthbert) has two personalities: In one, she's a sweet, misunderstood kid who has never been loved, and in the other she's a twisted emotional sadist who amuses herself by toying with the feelings of the naive Matthew. The movie alternates between these personalities at its convenience, making her quite the most unpleasant character I have seen in some time.

You see, the realism of the film is the thing that made people like it, or dislike it. It is, in essence, the real story of what might happen if a good kid fell in love with a porn star, and the porn star was unable to pull both feet out of her old life. It is much too close to reality to work as a feel-good coming-of-age fantasy, ala Risky Business. Yes, The Girl Next Door has the veneer of a raunchy teen comedy, but that is a thin coating at best. Underneath the laughter, it comes very close to being a real-life drama, and often cuts close to the bone. You just have to accept this film on its own terms, and many people just didn't want to do that.

It is a different kind of movie, and I understand why it made many people uneasy. It was not what I expected, either.

Yet I felt it was kind of a good flick. (It's rated a solid 6.8 at IMDb). It's well acted, and much more soulful than you would think, with characters drawn much closer to the reality of teen life and porn life than you would expect.