Der Tod lauert nebenan

Jessica, a working mother and landlady has got to be the most dumbest character I've seen in a film. She took on a new tenant without checking him and then dropped her daughter into trouble by informing this evil tenant what she heard. This woman and her moron father ignored the warning alarms that tenant was giving off. Only the daughter grew suspicious but her mother wouldn't believe it. A silly and predictable film. Also it annoys me that Hollywood thinks mental illness is evil and that evil runs in the family.

The title is a dead giveaway, obviously this guy is anything but the perfect tenant, in fact he is a psychopath hellbent on revenge. The film begins with a nine year old boy witnessing his father's suicide. Fast forward and it soon becomes clear why the old man took his own life, and what his son wants. The plot is fairly straightforward but it does get a bit complicated until we realise his sister is working with him undercover in a manner of speaking. After locating the woman they hold responsible for Daddy topping himself, their plan is to murder her father, disguising his death as a heart attack, fleece her of the life insurance money, and then, well, you know what is supposed to come next.

The best laid plans of mice and psychos don't always go like clockwork, and this one has a few problems to contend with en route, including a crazy girlfriend who turns up unannounced making a scene, and his sister not having the stomach to go through with their plan, in reality his plan.

"The Perfect Tenant" isn't a bad film, but bad guy Maxwell Caulfield is so creepy as Danny you have to wonder if any woman in her right mind would let him through the front door, much less rent him an apartment.

"The Perfect Tenant" is a taut, well-constructed little TV thriller with Maxwell Caufield slipping once again into the role of a steely psychopath. Blue-eyed, impossibly photogenic Caufield makes for such an unexpected villain that you can't help but delight in all the havoc he wreaks. There's some genuinely nasty stuff here that wouldn't make it into a similar production today: we get a forced potassium chloride injection, a staged recreation of a Christmas suicide, and some pretty intense trauma flashbacks. I was surprised several times by the approach this film took: it packs up enough fake-outs and feints to keep any made-for-TV thriller addict satisfied.

I appreciated that all the major twists were largely out of the way by the halfway point, allowing us to revel in the mayhem rather than waiting for a big reveal. "The Perfect Tenant" is solid stuff, although one would be advised to check out Caufield in the terrific "Mind Games" first. That movie also features him as a family-disrupting psychopath, but with more of a darkly subversive bent.

I wasn't expecting much when I rented it but I was fairly surprised. Overall, "PT" is a solid little flick that accomplishes exactly what it's supposed to. Great performance by Maxwell Caulfield. Linda Purl and Earl Holliman (as daughter and father) are quite good, as is the rest of the cast. Script and all technical aspects are above par. Definitely engaging and worth watching.

This 2000 supposedly thriller was by M. Todd Bonin and Jim Vines from a story by Mark Castaldo and directed by Doug Campbell who also was co-writer. So many guys involved with this and what a mess they all turned out. Won't belabor the story but it's all about deception. In this case a nice all-American good looking young man who rents the guest cottage from a lovely young thing who lives with her father and daughter in the big house. The rest is all suspense, or supposed to be. Linda Purl, as the woman of the house, is not the best of actresses. She was also slow on getting what was going on around her. Why is it the heroine is always brain dead? And then in the end she suddenly gets all this courage and intelligence to do our villain in? Maxwell Caufield, as the young man who moved in, was very good as the villain. I was hoping he'd get away with the crime with all the stupidity around him. Stacy Hogue as the daughter had a few moments, but only a few. She spent most of the time spying on our villain until she finally got the message but too late. Oh, well. Tracy Nelson, Ricky's daughter, I've seen before in something where she was psychotic, but not sure what. She did the most stupid thing by escaping, not outside and she could have, but upstairs where she could get caught. Another stupid mistake. Oh, and the boy friend to Stacy, makes the most stupid mistake. When he's spotted by the killer in the woods, and gets the chance to escape, he grabs the gun and chases him till he's out of bullets. Another stupid character and choice. Melissa Behr plays an interesting role convincingly. However, at first you think she's on our side until she begins to get in trances, one after another. And finally there's Earl Holliman, who's body of work is amazing. His work is respected by many (GIANT, RAINMAKER) but what a waste of that talent in this. However, even in the small role he played, he was the most convincing. Caufield wasn't bad. That's why I wanted him to win. So, I give this 2 stars for Holliman and Caufield, two interesting actors.