The Resident (2011)

When a young doctor suspects she may not be alone in her new Brooklyn loft, she learns that her landlord has formed a frightening obsession with her.

Director:

Antti Jokinen

Writers:

Antti Jokinen, Robert Orr

Stars:

Hilary Swank, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Lee Pace

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Hilary Swank	...	Dr. Juliet Devereau
Jeffrey Dean Morgan	...	Max
Lee Pace	...	Jack
Christopher Lee	...	August
Aunjanue Ellis	...	Sydney
Sean Rosales	...	Carlos
Deborah Martinez	...	Mrs. Portes
Sheila Ivy Traister	...	ER Nurse (as Sheila Traister)
Michael Showers	...	August ER Doctor
Nana Visitor	...	Real Estate Agent
Arron Shiver	...	Architect
Michael Badalucco	...	Moving Man
Michael Massee	...	Security Tech
Penny Balfour	...	Drug Addict
Mark Morocco	...	ER Surgeon (as Mark Vincent Morocco)

Storyline

In New York, Dr. Juliet Bliss Devereau of the Brooklyn General Hospital has ended her relationship with her boyfriend Jack and is seeking an apartment in Brooklyn to live alone. She finds a bargain in an old apartment building owned by the handsome and lonely Max and one night she misinterprets his signals and dates him. However she concludes that it is too soon to have a love affair and she asks Max to leave her apartment. However she does not know that Max is a deranged man obsessed on her and that he spies her from secret openings in her apartment. Further, Max is drugging Juliet every night and sexually abusing her. Juliet has troubles to wake up in the morning to go to the hospital and decides to install a monitoring system in her apartment. She learns the truth about Max but how will she escape from the insane landlord?

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Plot Keywords:

landlord | face slap | hotel room | bare chested male | woman in panties | 

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Taglines:

She Thought She Was Living Alone

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Genres:

Mystery | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for violence, language and brief sexuality/nudity

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

UK USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

11 March 2011 (UK)

Also Known As:

Invasion of Privacy

Filming Locations:

Albuquerque Studios - 5650 University Boulevard SE, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$20,000,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Hammer Film Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

91 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital DTS (as Datasat Digital Sound)

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Director Antti Jokinen told in an interview for Finnish television on June 19, 2010 that Jessica Alba was at first attached to play the role which eventually went to Hilary Swank. Jokinen also told that at one point Maggie Gyllenhaal was attached to the role.

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Goofs

When Juliet calls the hospital to inform that she will be late (1:04.45h) she obviously doesn't talk to anybody, we see the locked screen of her iPhone with the typical "slide to unlock" screen. It's not possible to make a call while an iPhone is locked.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Juliet Devereau: [receiving ER patient] Okay. We're going to intubate this guy and fix the hole in his heart.

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Connections

Referenced in Bad Movie Beatdown: Review of 2011 (2012)

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Soundtracks

"Double Dare You"
Written by Katherine Liner, Chris Johnson
Performed by Katherine Liner
Courtesy of Ivy Lane Music

User Reviews

Somebody likes your toothbrush

This is a American shot thriller from a Finnish director and put out by the recently revived Hammer Film--yep, the British production company known for its atmospheric horrors. "The Resident" gives nods to "Single White Female," "One Hour Photo" and "Fatal Attraction," where it's a dark tale of infatuation that builds and builds into a roaring obsession due to an object of desire that's out of physical reach.

Some look for specific qualities or rewards in relationships than others, such as a momentary bit of comfort, physical release or warmth and security. There's a middle ground where you both meet in agreement, yet there are those that want things to fall specifically in place and only go the way they want them to. There's going to be zero compromise with those aggressively tuned people, just a one track freight train of a strong personality and another unsuspecting person caught frozen on the tracks.

A woman named Juliet, played by Hilary Swank, is looking for an apartment after hitting a rough spot. She works by day as a doctor and after living in her new residence for a short while she's being watched with a privy eye at night. This has a few unsettling moments, as the watcher slowly works themselves up to get close enough to know what the bristles of her toothbrush feel like, as well as the brand of her undergarments. There's no real surprise as to who it is as there's only four main characters shown and three of them quickly seem unlikely. The filmmakers realized about a third of the way in and dropped the whole mystery element in order to escalate the encroaching visits in first person to Juliet's apartment. If it wasn't predictable enough, she eventually starts to suspect something's amiss and decides to take matters into her own hands in order to figure out the truth about what's going bump at night and why she feels so weird in the morning. Though the closer she gets, it causes the person to step out from the shadows for a finale that wraps up somewhat abruptly.

"The Resident" has a formula that's been done before with films that deal with unabated fixations that lead to stalking and voyeurism. This was a common template for slasher films, though this is definitely missing the gore and guts, but intact is the cinematic thrills. This does take it another step further with a few memorable scenes that push things over the top even if it mostly hints at them without actually revealing them head-on in explicit detail. That seems to be the main purpose: to show some suspenseful scenes and to cut and paste characters into scenarios in order to make that happen, as the story itself felt straightforward and ultimately inevitable. This might be effective towards creeping out your squeamish girlfriend, as it gives paranoid thought to sleeping alone and putting blind trust into strangers, otherwise there's not a whole lot of substance here to mine or to come back to for replay value. (Also submitted on http://fromblacktoredfilmreviews.blogspot.com/)