The Girl Next Door (2004 film)

The Girl Next Door is a 2004 American romantic comedy film directed by Luke Greenfield and written by David Wagner, Brent Goldberg, and Stuart Blumberg. It stars Emile Hirsch, Elisha Cuthbert, Timothy Olyphant, James Remar, Chris Marquette, and Paul Dano. The story follows Matthew Kidman, a high school senior who falls for his new neighbor, Danielle, and discovers she is a former adult film actress.

Filmed primarily in California, the film features cinematography by Eric Alan Edwards and a score by Paul Haslinger. It was released on April 9, 2004, to mixed reviews—praised for its performances but criticized for tonal inconsistencies. Though it underperformed at the box office, The Girl Next Door later gained a cult following through home media and television, with retrospective appreciation for its genre subversion and portrayal of the adult entertainment industry.^[1][7][8][9]

Matthew Kidman, an ambitious high school senior in suburban Los Angeles, has been accepted to Georgetown University but lacks the funds to attend. As class president, he raises $25,000 to help a Cambodian student, Samnang, study in the United States, but feels his own high school experience has been uneventful. His closest friends, Eli and Klitz, are more focused on mischief and adult films than academics or self-reflection.

Matthew’s routine changes when Danielle, an attractive young woman, moves in next door. After a series of playful and flirtatious interactions, the two begin a tentative romance. Their relationship is disrupted when Matthew learns from Eli that Danielle is a former adult film actress. Following misguided advice from his friends, Matthew takes Danielle to a motel and treats her inappropriately, leading her to end the relationship and consider returning to the adult industry.

Determined to make amends, Matthew tracks Danielle to an adult film convention in Las Vegas, where he confronts her former producer and ex-boyfriend, Kelly. Despite Kelly’s threats, Matthew convinces Danielle to leave the industry. Days later, Kelly retaliates by abducting Matthew and coercing him into stealing from a rival producer, Hugo Posh. After narrowly escaping police capture, Matthew arrives at a scholarship dinner under the influence of ecstasy and gives an impromptu speech but fails to secure the award.

Kelly escalates the conflict by posing as a school advisor and stealing the $25,000 fund. To recover the money and clear Matthew's name, Danielle proposes producing an educational adult film featuring her former colleagues and Matthew's classmates. Eli directs the film, and Klitz unexpectedly steps into a key role. The project is a success, and Matthew and Danielle become intimate.

The next day, Kelly arrives at Matthew’s home with a copy of the film, threatening to expose him. However, upon viewing it, Matthew’s parents and principal are surprised to find that it is a modern sex education video. Realizing the film’s value, they support its distribution. Kelly, defeated, begrudgingly concedes.

Matthew partners with Hugo Posh to distribute the film, earning enough to fund Samnang’s education. Eli begins a promising film career, Klitz gains new confidence, and Matthew departs for Georgetown with Danielle by his side.

The Girl Next Door was considered a box office disappointment.^[10] It grossed $14.6 million in the United States and Canada, and $15.8 million in international markets, for a worldwide total of approximately $30.4 million.^[6] Director Luke Greenfield later claimed that Fox's marketing contributed to the film's financial failure, since they tried to market it towards a teenage girl audience, when it was mainly intended for a 18 to 30 year old male audience.^[10] He said, "our movie, there was such a challenge, because we're at 20th Century Fox, which at the time was a very conservative studio. The idea that they had to go out there and sell an R-rated movie about teenagers and about a kid falling in love with a porn star? They tried. They spent money. They didn’t know how to do it [...] the marketing destroyed the movie."^[10]

In 2004, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment released an unrated version of the film on DVD.^[11] 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment also released this unrated version on Blu-Ray in 2009.^[12]

In 2019, Rupert Murdoch sold most of 21st Century Fox's film and television assets to Disney. However, much of The Girl Next Door's underlying rights were with production company Regency Enterprises rather than Fox, and Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation are not mentioned as one of the copyright holders in the credits.^[13] At the time of the sale, Fox had a 20% stake in Regency Enterprises, and this 20% stake was transferred to Disney when they purchased the Fox entertainment assets.^[14]

On the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 56% based on 159 reviews, with an average score of 5.6/10. The website's consensus reads, "The movie borrows heavily from Risky Business (1983), though Emile Hirsch and Elisha Cuthbert are appealing leads."^[15] Metacritic reports a weighted average score of 47 out of 100, based on 32 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews."^[16] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.^[17]

Sheri Linden of The Hollywood Reporter praised the film as a "sharp, vivacious comedy."^[18] Desson Thomson of The Washington Post described it as "an entertaining affair whose wild-card creativity never ceases to surprise."^[19] Writing for Entertainment Weekly, Owen Gleiberman gave the film a "B−", noting that while it was derivative, "this genial cardboard knockoff is contrived from the start but gets better as it goes along."^[20]

In a more mixed review, Joe Leydon of Variety criticized the film's "shamelessly derivative" script, drawing comparisons to Risky Business, American Pie (1999), and 1980s teen romances. He described the lead performances as "attractive but bland," though he praised Timothy Olyphant's "scene-stealing turn."^[21][22] A. O. Scott of The New York Times observed that the film presents a "nonjudgmental, even celebratory" view of pornography but noted a contradictory tone in portraying Danielle as someone in need of rescue. He concluded that the film "wallow[s]" in its own contradiction without offering much genuine pleasure.^[23] Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film one and a half stars out of four, calling it a "nasty piece of business" and criticizing its misleading marketing as a teen comedy.^[24]

The Girl Next Door was released on DVD and VHS in the United States on August 24, 2004. A Blu-ray edition followed on September 1, 2009.

• The Girl Next Door at IMDb