Troubled kid Kale (Shia LaBeouf) is under house arrest for the summer. When boredom sets in, he begins to spy on his neighbors, eventually discovering that one of them is a serial killer. What follows is a modern retelling of the classic Hitchcock thriller "Rear Window," updated with a teenage cast, high-tech spy gear, more violence, and a jacked-up body count. It's a somewhat dumb-yet-efficient teen suspense jolt-fest, and the presence of the handsomely creepy David Morse is such a standard-issue example of typecasting that it's like modern movie code for "this is the bad guy, in case you hadn't already guessed." But it works on its own terms, even if the spirit of Grace Kelly and Jimmy Stewart is nowhere to be found. B
Kinsey Scale: 1 (Co-star Carrie-Anne Moss, as Kale's long-suffering mother, is always a welcome sight for lesbian audiences.)
Perfect Stranger
When her old friend Grace (Nicki Aycox) turns up dead, investigative reporter Rowena (Halle Berry) suspects her pal's latest lover, adman Harrison Hill (Bruce Willis). Determined to catch a killer, Ro embarks on a dangerous game, going undercover at Hill's firm and using her seductive wiles on the sleazy businessman. This monumentally silly thriller starts off well, smartly setting up the circumstances surrounding the murder, but it soon devolves into foolishness. Far too much dialogue is wasted on pointless exposition, while the growing number of red herrings and suspects quickly becomes comical. Berry's beauty and Willis' tawdry charm are formidable assets, not small considerations, since with suspense and logic in short supply, only their devoted fans are likely to warm to this lame mystery. C-
Kinsey Scale: 3 (As the movie starts, Rowena is working on a story about a closeted senator and his Mark Foley-like affair with an intern. According to office scuttlebutt, Hill's executive assistant is a lesbian. Among the cast, Giovanni Ribisi had a role in "The Dead Girl"; Clea Lewis was a regular on "Ellen"; Kathleen Chalfont was in "Kinsey" and "The Laramie Project"; and early in her career, Patti D'Arbanville starred in Andy Warhol's "Flesh" and as the sensual title character in the Sapphic erotic drama "Bilitis.")
