Fred Walton’s urban legend-inspired When a Stranger Calls began life as a short film, only to be expanded past the twenty-minute mark once Halloween unearthed a box-office market for serial killer thrillers. The problem with such a profit-driven plan, however, was that Walton’s short – which functions as the feature film’s famous first segment, in which babysitter Carol Kane discovers that a threatening prank caller is telephoning her from inside the house! – was a one-scare device, and didn’t necessitate any of the subsequent filler concerning Charles Durning’s private investigator searching for Tony Beckley’s on-the-loose fiend with the help of Colleen Dewhurst’s prickly boozehound. With virtually no character development and a cast of typically solid actors employing an affected technique whereby long, tortured pauses accompany (and interrupt) every line of dialogue, the film is, outside of its reasonably taut intro and an effectively overblown score by Dana Kaproff, aggravatingly devoid of suspense. But then, it’s probably foolish to hope for competent scares from a thriller that thinks it wise to stage multiple on-foot chase sequences involving the plump Durning.
Perhaps the worst film (other than Rollerball) I have seen in years. If I hadn't spent the previous 2 weeks salivating over the terror it would provide me, I would've been out of there with the quickness.
Instead, I sucked it (I won't say what "it" was--at least not aloud) up and remained seated through to the end. Bad mistake. Fortunately, I made a wrong turn leaving the theater and ended up watching Glory Road, which is an excellent movie and made up for the EXTREME disappointment I felt after When a Stranger Calls.
Posted by: Patrick | February 04, 2006 at 11:54 AM
the new version of when a stranger calls is gay...you don't even see any killing, and who the hell did the stranger end up being?
Posted by: Dalton Drouillard | February 04, 2006 at 11:15 PM
Um, this is a review of the original 1979 version of When a Stranger Calls, not of the remake.
Posted by: Nick | February 06, 2006 at 04:28 PM