The cost of repression and the power of liberation are recurring themes in director John Duigan's work (Sirens, Flirting, Lawn Dogs), but his latest film, the loathsome Paranoid, is a creepy thriller that subscribes to a reactionary, conservative view of sexuality that's antithetical to much of what he's stood for in the past. A blank Jessica Alba is the dead weight at the center of Paranoid: She plays a promiscuous, pill-popping supermodel who travels to a secluded house in the countryside to attend a reunion of her much older boyfriend's band, which was popular in the '80s but has since faded into obscurity. Once there, however, Alba learns that her boyfriend is married, and she's later handcuffed to a bed and held against her will by a demented group of music-industry types who seem equally likely to appear on Where Are They Now? and a British version of America's Most Wanted. Buried somewhere within Paranoid is vague subtext about how society objectifies the young and beautiful, projecting its own fantasies onto the improbably perfect faces of its pop icons. But that subtext is never developed beyond window dressing for a depressingly unoriginal, sordid depiction of drug-crazed, out-of-control libertines bottoming out. Duigan at one point even resorts to throwing in spooky-looking dolls for atmosphere—a sure sign of desperation for a thriller—and employs a deaf, near-mute child (Mischa Barton) to serve as both heavy-handed symbolism and an insultingly contrived motor to propel the limp plot forward. Like its dispirited gang of villains, Paranoid doesn't seem to have much of an idea what it wants to do, drifting from scene to scene powered by little more than its own overarching creepiness. Devoid of suspense and a major disappointment from a once-promising director, Paranoid aims low and achieves even less.