The Perfect Neighbor, an acclaimed new documentary, tells the story of a dispute in a Florida neighborhood with fatal consequences.Directed by Geeta Gandbhir, it’s told through police body camera footage, 911 calls, and other found sources.The documentary will stream on Netflix on Oct. 17.<\/p>\n
A documentary<\/a> composed almost entirely through police body camera footage is being touted as one of the most powerful films of the year.\n<\/p>\n The Perfect Neighbor, slated to debut on Netflix<\/a> in October, utilizes candid videos and 911 calls to unspool a 2023 dispute between neighbors in Ocala, Fla., that ended in murder.\n<\/p>\n The documentary scored a prize for its director, Geeta Gandbhir (Katrina: Come Hell and High Water), upon its premiere at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival<\/a>. Since then, it’s garnered ample acclaim and triggered fierce discussions about paranoia, community, and U.S. gun laws.\n<\/p>\n Gandbhir’s film is already being discussed as a potential Oscar contender, and its hot-button themes will surely permeate the discourse following its release. Below is everything to know about The Perfect Neighbor, from its release date and trailer to the details of the real-life tragedy that led to its creation.\n<\/p>\n What is The Perfect Neighbor about? <\/p>\n ‘The Perfect Neighbor’ on Netflix.<\/p>\n Netflix<\/p>\n “Using bodycam footage from dozens of police visits,\u00a0The Perfect Neighbor\u00a0bears witness to a tight-knit community navigating one neighbor\u2019s relentless harassment,” reads the official logline. “But her hostility takes a sinister turn when it escalates into a fatal crime.”\n<\/p>\n The incident involved 35-year-old Ajike “AJ” Shantrell Owens, who was shot through a locked door and killed by a neighbor, 58-year-old Susan Lorincz. The murder occurred after what’s said to be years of tension between Lorincz and the Ocala, Fla., community in which she lived.\n<\/p>\n “How do you get from living next door to someone and they\u2019re just your neighbor, to picking up a gun and committing such a horrible act?” Gandbhir said in a chat with fellow documentarian Petra Costa<\/a>. “How do you get there? What could possibly lead to that? And I think that question of how we turn on each other, how we become so polarized, again, is the beating heart of this film. How are we divided? We were trying to answer that in this process.”<\/p>\n Is there a trailer for The Perfect Neighbor? <\/p>\n Yes, Netflix released the official trailer for The Perfect Neighbor on Sept. 23.\n<\/p>\n The two-minute clip eases audiences into the documentary’s unique visual approach, which tells its story almost entirely through 911 calls and footage culled from body cameras worn by police officers.\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n “We really wanted to just live in the police body camera footage and not impose any voice-over or interviews or anything like that, so people could feel embedded within the community,” said Gandbhir.\n<\/p>\n She added, “We had to sync all these hours of police body camera footage, which just came to us in a jumble, and figure out which audio went with which police officer. There were always two on the scene. There were also 911 calls and calls just that the shooter made to the police. And then there were detective interviews with the community. Figuring out who everyone was [was] a complete puzzle.”<\/p>\n When does The Perfect Neighbor come out? <\/p>\n ‘The Perfect Neighbor’ on Netflix.<\/p>\n Netflix<\/p>\n The Perfect Neighbor will play in select theaters beginning Oct. 10. It will stream on Netflix on Oct. 17.\n<\/p>\n What happened to Susan Lorincz? <\/p>\n Following the shooting, Lorincz was charged with manslaughter with a firearm, culpable negligence, battery, and two counts of assault, per PEOPLE<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n Lorincz’s defense cited Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law, which allows for citizens to use deadly force in certain cases as a means of self-defense.\n<\/p>\n Lorincz was found guilty<\/a> of manslaughter by use of a firearm in August 2024. In November of that year, she was sentenced to 25 years<\/a> in prison.<\/p>\n Where can I watch The Perfect Neighbor? <\/p>\n The Perfect Neighbor will play in select theaters before streaming on Netflix.\n<\/p>\n Sign up for\u00a0Entertainment Weekly<\/a>‘s free daily newsletter<\/a>\u00a0to get breaking TV news, exclusive first looks, recaps, reviews, interviews with your favorite stars, and more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Perfect Neighbor, an acclaimed new documentary, tells the story of a dispute in a Florida neighborhood with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":158301,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[96,2839,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-158300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158300\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}