Review: The Roommate

In a world where teen slasher films have given way to mindless, horny partying, The Roommate doesn't exactly stand out but definitely fits in.

As I sat in my seat and looked around, I noticed that pretty much the entire theatre was empty and that the only seats taken were occupied by pairs of teenage girls, all texting and giggling relentlessly. If that wasn't enough, I knew I was in trouble when the title slide hit, followed by a montage of the LA party scene, all accompanied by tasteless pop rock.

And the teen thriller cliches don't stop there. In the beginning party scene alone, me and my girlfriend were able to point out and predict pretty much every stereotypical incident that exist in this type of movie, down to the cute guy spilling the spiked punch all over to get the girl's attention, and they all happen. From there, the rest of the film follows a predictable string of events that ultimately turn The Roommate into a snoozefest.

Not only is Sonny Mallhi's script formulaic, it doesn't even live up to its categorized genre; there isn't anything thrilling about this movie. At no point in this film was I on on the edge of my seat waiting for whatever might come next. Everything came slowly and when something did happen, it had the intensity of a highly anticipated sloth race.

The performances in this film are bland. Leighton Messer is only OK as the psychopathic roommate who has relationship issues with her parents as well as her new fashion student of a roommate, played unenthusiastically by Minka Kelly. There is almost no depth to these characters and by the time the filmmakers actually attempted to explore Messer's backstory, I had already lost interest.

Above all, this film idolizes beauty in the form of skinny, white females. You'd be hard pressed to find anybody of any other ethnicity in this film, even as an extra. In fact, the only African American chick in this film disappears literally ten minutes into the film for no apparent reason, along with many other characters who are just dropped and never seen or heard from again.

By the time the end credits hit, I was filled with a plethora of emotions. First, I couldn't believe I actually paid to see this and by the end I was fed up with the chatty, overexcited teenage girls who actually bought into this crap. But even more so, I was just glad it was all over.