"Lakeview Terrace": Welcome! You'll be very uncomfy here

The answer is no: We can't all just get along. And by the way, !@#$% you.

At least it is in "Lakeview Terrace," a racial thriller that may be the feel-bad movie of the summer.

An interracial couple (Patrick Wilson, Kerry Washington) move into a new house in L.A., and their black racist cop neighbor (Samuel L. Jackson) begins to harass and then terrorize them. Figure in the notion of a "Breaking Point" — reportedly an early name for the film — and you've got your well-acted potboiler.

Abel Turner (Jackson) is a stern single dad whose strictness only alienates his two kids. He patrols the neighborhood at night, apparently without being asked. And he's got a number of question marks on his record as a cop.

There's something he hates about the new ebony-and-ivory situation next door, and at first he simply needles bland yuppie Chris (Wilson) for listening to rap: "You can listen to that noise all night long, but when you wake up in the morning you'll still be white." The needling turns to pranks: Abel's security lights shining through the couple's bedroom window at night, sabotaged air-conditioning.

The young Mattsons have issues of their own: Lisa (Washington) wants to get pregnant right away, but Chris wants to get settled. And he's got an uneasy relationship with her condescending dad (Ron Glass).

Abel's pranks turn much more serious as Chris does a slow burn — and a big fire slowly approaches the neighborhood. Attention, citizens: This is the Subtlety Police. There is metaphor approaching. In a way, "Lakeview Terrace" is a return to form for smart director Neil LaBute after his reeking remake of "The Wicker Man." His early films, "In the Company of Men" and "Your Friends & Neighbors," are minor masterpieces of discomfort and meanness. If the goal is discomfort here, then it's effective enough that I needed some drinks afterward. But that doesn't seem like enough — and I don't mean the drinks.

There's no one to root for — Chris' most positive trait is that he simply hasn't done anything to anyone. Abel's motivation, when it's finally revealed, is too simplistic and might have been better left out.

You can't ignore the timing of this movie. It's either brilliant or seriously unfortunate, given the amount of racism — both coded and overt, and too numerous to list here — that's emerged in response to Barack Obama's campaign.

And so, when one of Chris' friends at a party says, "I so want to date a black girl," to his mild shock, it seems like bad, unrealistic dialogue. There are a number of lines that prompt the response, Did he just say that — in 2008?

Yep. There's a poster on the Mattsons' wall for "Watermelon Man," a 1970 flick about a white bigot who wakes up black. It's a slightly less obvious sign than the fire that LaBute (and screenwriters David Loughery and Howard Korder) is trying to say something about race. What that is — or, giving them the benefit of the doubt, if it's even just to get latent ugliness out in the open — you can debate on your own time.

Seems to me that the goal is mainly a long windup and violent catharsis.

Mark Rahner: 206-464-8259

or mrahner@seattletimes.com