The Voyeurs review – Sydney Sweeney has a room with a sexy view

A sleek and spacious Montreal apartment is the setting for Hitchcock-inspired erotic throwback The Voyeurs, the kind that will quickly have you asking: “Well, how the hell can they afford to live there?” The film's young couple, Pippa (Sydney Sweeney) and Thomas (Justice Smith), have traded fiery passion for a sense of comfort. She puts on lingerie, only to find he’s fallen asleep. It doesn’t help that they can see right into the apartment across the street, where another couple – a photographer and a model – have sex in plain sight.

For a while, the film plays to the usual beats of obsessive voyeurism glimpsed in the likes of Rear Window and Brian De Palma’s own Hitchcock riff Body Double. Until it doesn’t. The twists, when they inevitably come, are outlandish to the point they're likely to invoke a verbal cry of disbelief – though implausible enough that we doubt we should have taken any of this seriously in the first place. The wavering tone doesn’t help to clarify the mood, but there’s just enough self-awareness and neat table setting on display to make the whole exhibition worthwhile (this is, admittedly, a 90 minute movie running at almost two hours).

Those lamenting the lack of sex in the movies these days will find this to be a salacious antidote to the sanitised multiplexes. Director Michael Mohan doesn’t skimp on the nudity and builds tension through sequences hinged on the slow removal of clothing. Sweeney is more than willing to play ball. Her blend of sexual curiosity and naivety makes for a sizzling combination. Yet one can't help but wonder whether all this might've played better had the leads been fed-up in their thirties instead of gorgeous twenty-somethings who seem far too young to be this bored with life.

The Voyeurs is now streaming on Amazon Prime Video.