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Alfred Hitchcock may have been dead for almost three decades but his legacy lives on — unfortunately to a large degree in directors who have never seemed to capture that level of intrigue or menace: Brian de Palma, Gus van Sant and Robert Zemeckis. They've all tried, but for the most part have served up a mishmash of Hitchcockian elements that resembles something closer to fan fiction than anything else.

And, unfortunately, the latest attempt at recapturing that elusive neo-noir Hitchcock style — this time by the relatively unknown D.J. Caruso — has also failed.

That's not to say 'Disturbia' is bad. At least not in the sense that you don't want to go along for the ride. You do, even though there is never any doubt as to where said ride is heading. It's just not very exciting, original or even thrilling… which just isn't acceptable for a movie purporting to be a thriller.

We start with young Kale played by the soon-to-be-everywhere Shia LaBeouf ('Transformers', 'Constantine' and the upcoming 'Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull') who is having a tough time ever since his father died. When Kale attacks a teacher, he is placed under house arrest and fitted with a sensor that alerts the police every time he wanders too far.

His mother then decides, as he is going to be sitting at home for the next three months, that it would be a good idea to cut him off from all of his vices such as iTunes and internet-based games. (Bear in mind, she was told that people under house arrest often get so bored they lose their minds.)

So poor bored Kale takes up a new hobby. Armed with a video camera and a pair of binoculars he starts spying on his neighbours, watching their movements, figuring out who sleeps with who, who watches porn and who has some dirty little secrets. As he says: "It's reality TV without the TV". It's also not the healthiest of hobbies, but that's what you get when a 17 year old is deprived of his Xbox.

As luck would have it, Kale stumbles upon the nocturnal activities of a certain Mr Turner (David Morse) a mysterious neighbour who seems to have a predilection for bringing pretty young girls to his house and never letting them leave.

Of course Kale's mom and the police don't believe him, so along with his friends, Ronnie and Ashley, Kale takes matters into his own hands. And of course the fact that he can't leave his house makes the task a little more difficult.

So if you can look past the banal plot, the sometimes hammy acting and the fact that there are more plotholes than you can point a camera at, 'Disturbia' is definitely a passable DVD idea for a rainy Saturday night.

As an answer to Hitchcock it fails miserably… even as fan fiction.