A young boy finds himself at odds with his kidnappers in this pretty good film that is set to continue star Lonnie Chavis as an up-and-coming star on the rise.

Bobby Green and Kevin O’Connor are best friends who one day find their lives turned upside down when after school, find themselves kidnapped and put in the trunk of a car. Taken to an abandoned house in the middle of nowhere, Bobby wakes up still inside the trunk but cannot find Kevin. As Bobby attempts to flee, he hears Kevin screaming from inside the house and decides he has to save his buddy.

Upon entering the house, Bobby finds out Kevin is trapped in the attic. After encountering the Creep, who sees Bobby after he drops a paperweight, an altercation leads to the Creep’s death. Bobby soon learns that the kidnapper may know his whereabouts. However, he is successfully able to evade her. However, will Bobby be able to evade her long enough to rescue his buddy and save the both of them before it’s too late?

Since his star-making turns in Sunny Daze and The Water Man, teen actor Lonnie Chavis is on his way as a star on the rise. While the form gives the youngster a chance to stretch his emotional muscle, the latter gave him a chance to combine emotional drama with an adventure setting. For his latest starring role, we get to see how Chavis handles tense emotional drama and horror style violence. With the ability to try to do his own stunt work, Chavis could be an action star in the future.

Chavis’ Bobby is the titular “boy behind the door” as we see him go from being kidnapped to being stuck inside the trunk of a car. It is when he attempts to leave that he hears his friend’s screams from inside the house and therefore, makes the decision of going inside the house. Sure, Bobby shows that emotion of fear when he is confronted by the Creep, played by Micah Hauptman, but finds himself forced to defend himself. Now, this isn’t the type of hero where the youngster has a secret set of skills as we see Bobby just use the environment to defend and hide from his kidnapper.

While Ezra Dewey spends most of the film tied up as Kevin, hoping that Bobby will help both of them, it is when the kidnapper is revealed that things really picked up. And who better to play the kidnapper than Kristin Bauer van Straten? She has an amazing knack for playing less than favorable characters as she brings a sense of intensity to her roles. Like her roles in True Blood and last year’s Paradise Cove, she plays the type of character who only benefits for herself and could care less who gets hurt in the process. She is ruthless in both her manners and her ways as one can only presume the reason for the kidnapping involves a trafficking ring when she has a buyer for the kidnapped.

The Boy Behind the Door is a very thrilling debut for writer-directors David Charbonnier and Justin Powell. Lonnie Chavis continues his amazing streak of lead roles and once again, Kristin Bauer van Straten oozes intensity in the role of the antagonist.

WFG RATING: A-

RLJE Films and Shudder present a Whitewater Films production in association with Kinogo Pictures. Directors:  David Charbonnier and Justin Powell. Producers: Rick Rosenthal, Jim Hart, Ryan Scaringe, John Hermann, and Ryan Lewis. Writers: David Charbonnier and Justin Powell. Cinematography: Julian Amaru Estrada. Editing: Stephen Boyer.

Cast: Lonnie Chavis, Ezra Dewey, Kristen Bauer van Straten, Micah Hauptman, Scott Michael Foster.

The film is now available on DVD, Blu-Ray, Digital and On Demand platforms as well as on Shudder.