Release Date: March 29, 2011
Studio: Hammer Film / Image Entertainment
Genre: Thriller / Suspense
Rated: R    1 hr 31 mins

The Resident

June 24, 2011

Reviewer: Rottenbucher

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The once legendary Hammer thawed from a lengthy hibernation with the successful remake of Let the Right One In renamed Let Me In. Armed with Hillary Swank and their original studio star, Christopher Lee in a small role, The Resident proves to be a rather simplistic violent thriller that will undoubtedly only creep out single women.

Juliet (Swank) has recently been jilted by her lover and is now off on her own in Brooklyn.  The sulking yet sexy and svelte ER doctor decides to take a more than perfect apartment in a building run by the equally pouty Max (Jeffery Dean Morgan, Watchmen, P.S. I Love You).  While Max continues to work on improving the building and make passes at Juliet, his creepy and cantankerous grandfather August (Lee) seems to also show an interest in the back-on-the-market doctor.  Max and Juliet attempt some sort of rebound fling before Juliet gets frigid and returns to pining over her former lover.  The problem is Max is now pining over Juliet and the perfect apartment is getting too moody.

Finnish director Antti Jokien takes The Resident into familiar territory but also decides to turn the film on its head by giving the whole stalking aspect away drastically early.  Even though the script telegraphs itself, there are some nice moments early in the film that leave the viewer guessing just who is stalking Juliet.  Is it Max?  It could be August who continually peers out of his apartment.  Or even her former lover Jack (Lee Pace, Pushing Daisies) or perhaps someone else. But Jokien decides to cough up this reveal really early and The Resident switches into a violent cat-and-mouse tale.

Hillary Swank does a good job being depressed and desperate unless a male is making a pass at her and then she turns into a cheerleader.  But with her Jillian Michaels-physique and sternness portrayed at her job, it’s hard to believe she is this vulnerable to being manipulated, stalked and assaulted.  Christopher Lee, even with a rather brief but integral role, delivers one of the best moments in the flick.  His barking, “Are you loud?” to Swank as she moves in is not only fitting, but truly a grumpy geriatric question.  Jeffery Dean Morgan really steals the show by offering up a variety of emotions and even a bit of depth on screen.  But with Swank and Morgan occupying 99% of the film’s screen time, the film gets a little stuffy, especially when the violence starts.

While by no means an awful film, The Resident does seem to lose focus and degrade itself to nothing but violence and revenge about halfway through. There are plenty of tense moments and some of the violence and gore is pretty fun, but like the first portion of the film, it is also heavily telegraphed and won’t leave the audience guessing much once they catch the film’s drift.  If you aren’t into seeing Swank as the object of obsession while in salacious states, proving she could stand to eat a few cheeseburgers, The Resident might not be your thing.  But if female-in-distress thrillers like Sleeping with the Enemy or Single White Female are up your alley, there is some nice revenge in The Resident.

CAST:

Hillary Swank:  Juliet
Jeffery Dean Morgan:  Max
Christopher Lee: August
Lee Pace:  Jack
Aunjanue Ellis:  Sydney

DIRECTOR:

Antti Jokien