I don't know if its just that for the past month I've been binging far too many of these "Seducing A, Dating A, Married A, Stalked By A", "Wrong, Deadly, Killer, Good, Fatal", "Family Member, or Occupation" "In The Suburbs" movies, but this one really surprised me. Pleasantly surprised me in fact.
Typically the way this story goes in every other incarnation of this plot is mom's psychotic new beau gaslights everyone into thinking the main protagonist is out to get him, succeeds in sabotaging her credibility with her friends and her schooling, frames her for something, needlessly spree kills half the cast associated with the family in some way without the mom ever even batting an eye, and then somehow the bad guy evil-genius his end scenario, monologues with a gun, and is only finally taken out by some surprise gunshot from a character who has been opposed to the protagonist the whole movie until now.
This movie does none of that (except for the attempted sabotage with her medication). I was very much NOT enjoying the film and annoyed by just about everyone (including the daughter) UNTIL... Until the moment the daughter talks to her dad after she concludes that her mom's new boyfriend just tried to kill her.
Suddenly, I am engaged.
A protag capable of connecting dots?! Resourceful enough to gameplan, execute, and avoid the usual cliched pitfalls of these type of films (i.e. Bad guy suddenly appearing out of nowhere, bad guy conveniently within earshot of key dialogue, bad guy able to supervillain random acts of plot in his favor).
Every time the movie deviated from what typically happens I was even more in:
-- When she locks and barricaded her door -- ensured that any conversation about the bad guy happened while she was far from him -- created the "family movie outing" scenario; told her dad to NOT act impulsively and get himself arrested...
-- When the movie refrained from having the bad guy suddenly and randomly appear outside after her best friend plants a tracker onto his car -- and even the end (aside from the bestie parking her car out in the open on the one road leading to the bad guy's house) with how it utilized the youngest sister.
So despite my praise, my rating is entirely for the final 40 minutes of the movie. Because the plot itself is pretty ludicrous, honestly. Like this con man had a history of targeting single older women who meet untimely ends thus leaving him with their riches... So how does scamming a woman his same age, with kids, and potentially in the midst of an expensive divorce work out for him?
