The Perfect Guy movie review & film summary (2015)
It’s all very tasteful—too much so, perhaps—which makes the few crazy moments stand out as unintentionally funny rather than cohesive parts of a whole. You keep hoping that an insane Tyler Perry movie will burst free from these understated trappings, but no such luck.
The overqualified, magnetic stars do their best with this tepid material, however. (The script comes from Tyger Williams, whose last screenplay was 1993’s “Menace II Society.” Rosenthal, meanwhile, previously directed the appealing “Janie Jones” and the dreary “A Single Shot.”) Lathan, who’s incapable of finding a dishonest moment on screen, stars as Leah Vaughn, an L.A.-based lobbyist who seems to have it all: brains, looks, power, a gorgeous home and a loving, longtime boyfriend in architect Dave (the ubiquitous Morris Chestnut). After two years together, Leah is ready to get married and start a family; Dave, who’s been surrounded by divorce his whole life, isn’t. So that’s the end of that.
Conveniently, though, she meets cute not once but twice with a super-handsome guy named Carter (Michael Ealy). After sharing a flirty moment at a coffee shop, their paths cross again at a trendy restaurant when Carter swoops in to save Leah from a drunk dude’s unwanted advances at the bar. He really is too good to be true—perfect, even, hence the title. Besides his looks (and his propensity for shirtless, sweaty pushups), Carter is attentive, thoughtful, doting and has a successful career as a high-tech corporate security expert, which will come in handy once he starts making her life a living hell.
Because after the romantic dates, the passionate nightclub bathroom sex (which is, again, tasteful) and the heartwarming road trip to visit her parents in San Francisco (Charles S. Dutton and L. Scott Caldwell), Carter reveals his true nature when he savagely beats a stranger at a gas station for simply speaking to Leah. She is, naturally, disturbed and afraid. She pulls away like any strong, sane person would. This only makes Carter want her more, which he demonstrates by calling and texting her incessantly, breaking into her house, hiding surveillance equipment, hacking into her computer, stealing her cat and pushing her elderly across-the-street neighbor down a flight of stairs when she becomes suspicious of his antics.
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