Movie Review - The Stepfather (2009)

The Stepfather (2009)

Starring Dylan Walsh, Sela Ward, Penn Badgley, and Amber Heard

Directed by Nelson McCormick 

I have to wonder if this movie were simply made-for-tv and then distributed in multiplexes nationwide to satisfy some pre-existing contract.  It stars Dylan Walsh who's best known for Nip/Tuck; Sela Ward whom I've had a crush on since she was on tv's Once and Again (yes, I know she's much too old for me [although nowadays that may not be so true], but I really think she's hot); Penn Badgley who is apparently on Gossip Girl which I've never even seen a second of; and Amber Heard who I only know because she showed her boobs a lot in a movie no one saw (and no one should see) called The Informers.  All of these no-names come together for a remake of a film from the 1980s which starred Lost's John Locke himself Terry O'Quinn as the titular character.

All those tv stars, plus the fact that there's no absolutely cursing, no nudity, and very little blood makes me feel like this would fit right in on television.  And really, it would've made an ok lowered-expectation tv flick, but as an actual film, it's pretty darn awful.

The actors all actually are fairly decent and it's kind of nice to see at least half of this film revolve around the adults instead of the teenagers, but the plot about a seemingly perfect man (Walsh) who comes into a divorced woman's (Ward) life only to find out he may not be who he seems has been done tens of times before and done better.  There's no suspense because we the viewers know that this guy is awful (we're shown him walking away from his previous murder victims in the opening scene) and because we can pinpoint immediately which side characters are gonna bite the dust by the time the movie ends.  The murder scenes are just horribly plotted -- in one scene, the two sons are playing a video game loudly in their bedroom with the door open, but fail to hear breaking glass and a murder taking place a floor below them -- it was all just laughable.

My seemingly "go-to" flicks now are horror films after the great one-two punch of Drag Me to Hell and Orphan last year.  So, I find myself gravitating toward these silly things on Netflix's Instant Watch.  Unfortunately, most of them just aren't any good.  And this is no exception.

The RyMickey Rating: D