Directed by Stephan Rick
Written by Stephan Rick and Ross Partridge (based on the original screenplay by Stephan Rick and Silja Clemens)
Starring Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Luke Keintank, Eloise Smyth
Rated R
Runtime 1 hour 45 minutes
Opens in select theaters and on demand June 17

by Gary M. Kramer, Staff Writer

The glossy, serviceable thriller, The Good Neighbor, directed by Stephan Rick, is a 2021 remake of the filmmaker’s 2011 German film of the same name. But it is more reminiscent of Hollywood thrillers like The Good Son, or Single White Female, that were popular in the early 1990s.

This version, set in Riga, Latvia, has newly arrived journalist David (Luke Kleintank) befriending his neighbor, Robert (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), when he needs help with his car. (In the original, David borrowed a hammer.) The two men become fast friends and go out to a nightclub one evening. It is there that David meets Janine (Ieva Florence), and romantic sparks fly. However, driving home from the club, David accidently kills Janine who is biking home in the middle of a country road in the dark.

Robert helps David cover up the crime—something any good neighbor would do—and while David is wracked with guilt, Robert implores him to “move on. Don’t let this ruin us.” Making matters worse, David is assigned to report on the hit and run, which leads him to meet Vanessa (Eloise Smyth), Janine’s grieving, estranged sister.

The Good Neighbor follows all the expected paths this contrived setup suggests. David slowly falls in love with Vanessa, who is unaware he knew her sister. Robert silences (read: kills) anyone who can link David and him to the crime. And of course, a rift develops between David and Robert, which will cause each man to turn on the other.

Alas, the film makes much of this quite risible, most notably when David bemoans the lack of a bike lane after he runs down Janine. And perhaps the biggest shock in this thriller is that Vanessa inadvertently discovers a blatant fact—that clearly indicates David and Robert lied when they gave their alibis to the cops about the fateful night her sister died—but the police did not catch it. Maybe something has been lost in translation? (Ross Partridge cowrote the screenplay with Rick based on Rick’s original film).

Perhaps if Rick had flipped the script with this remake and told the film from Robert’s point of view instead of David’s, it would have been stronger. This is because Jonathan Rhys Meyers is the best thing in The Good Neighbor. He is seductive and sinister in equal measure, bringing this sleepy thriller to life whenever he is on screen. Robert and David are yoked to protect and rely on each other because of their complicity in the crime, and Robert uses that to keep David close. But Meyers also brings the subtext of Robert’s homoerotic desire very much to the surface. He longs to have dinners and fishing trips with David and gets jealous when David lies to him and goes out with Vanessa instead.

But the real turning point in the guys’ bromance comes when David cuts his finger. Robert instinctive sucks out the infection—he says he is a nurse—an act that disturbs David. (Read: sets off some gay panic.) As David draws away from Robert, Robert takes every opportunity to remind him who is boss from damaging David’s car to prompting a visit from the police.

Robert also shows up to a kayak trip David and Vanessa planned. That sequence, which involves a tense moment when Vanessa’s kayak overturns, is about as thrilling as The Good Neighbor ever gets. Of course, viewers should be worried that Vanessa will drown, or that David won’t save her in time, but it is more fun to hope that Robert will inadvertently cause her death and tie up one more loose end which will pave the way for him to be with David.

Arguably, the weakest part of the film is the blandly handsome Luke Kleintank who projects an absolutely lukewarm screen presence. Why Robert is so interested in dull David is a mystery explained in a throwaway claim that he always wanted a brother. But this really may be less to suggest Robert is gay, and more to sidestep equating homosexuality with deviance or psychopathic behavior.

Rick probably did not think quite that hard about his intentions in remaking The Good Neighbor. His flimsy film does not invite much consideration either.