Boy, oh boy. The Perfect Neighbor , directed by Geeta Gandbhir, is a documentary about a neighbourhood squabble that spirals out of hand. It’s almost entirely composed of police bodycam footage and closed-circuit camera images. The crime takes place in a relatively quiet suburban neighbourhood. The kids like to play on the adjoining lawns. The parents stand outside and chat while watching them. But there are neighbours who prefer to stay inside. There are people in the community who wish for an enforced noise curfew. These same people see children playing as evidence of an ever-worsening and unbearable offence.

It all starts with very minor disputes. The kids are too loud. They’re playing ding-dong-ditch using Susan Lorincz’s doorbell. So she calls the police. The kids are, once again, too loud, and too close to her home to let her and her two cats live in peace. Can this be annoying? Of course. But it isn’t malicious and, again, they are kids.

Susan is an adult, yet she swears at them and yells racial slurs at them. She calls the police multiple times a week. They, time and again, cajole her into understanding the reality of the laws in place: The kids are allowed to play wherever they want, up until where her property starts. Can they be annoying sometimes? Sure. Kids aren’t perfect, and they get lost in play. But the police understand this.

After speaking with Susan, they frequently go and talk to the other adult neighbours, and the parents of the kids. All of them, without fail, explain that Susan is the nuisance. Everyone else gets along. Everyone likes the kids. It is always her who escalates things.

The Perfect Neighbor not only shows bodycam footage from the police attending these events, it plays audio from Susan’s many 9-1-1 calls. In them, it is clear — regardless of what is happening in reality — she’s reaching a boiling point.

Believe it or not, “reality” is another element at play here. Police have conversation after conversation with Susan about how she perceives events versus how things unfolds in the realities of her neighbours. However, something inside of Susan seems irreparable. After a certain point, she makes the decision to turn outward from inward, and make her situation her neighbours’ problem.

At a certain point, The Perfect Neighbor makes clear its focus on Florida’s Stand Your Ground law, which allows use of fatal violence for self-defense under reasonable threat. Regardless of how immoral an action may be, the film asks if it is legal. Is there some sort of loophole one can use to turn a Stand Your Ground, defense-oriented law into an offensive one?

At a glance, the answer is (or should be) no. But everyone, now more than ever, is aware that the American judicial system is a slippery, finicky operation. If someone is sharp enough, they can use it as a tool rather than as a trial and consequence. It’s a relief when it works how it should.

The Perfect Neighbor is an incredibly moving, effectively told exploration of a tragedy. One might assume that the omission of talking head interviews with everyone related to the case would lessen the personal impact of The Perfect Neighbor . It does not. The footage (all kinds of it) speaks for itself, and it speaks volumes about American sensibilities, communities, and laws.

The Perfect Neighbor is streaming now on Netflix .