As I go to the invaluable IMDB.com to get information on writing this review, the first thing I see is the User Comment — Great opening and ending — lousy middle. This gentleman has summed up my thoughts exactly.
The film begins with Jill Johnson (Carol Kane, TV’s TAXI) going to the house of Mr. and Mrs. Mandrakis (Carmen Argenziano, GONE IN 60 SECONDS, & Rutanya Alda, THE REF) to babysit their children. The terror of her night begins when she gets a phone call stating, “Why haven’t you checked the children?” It’s a classic set-up that has a great twist, which I will leave a mystery for those few who do not know it. There is a bit of a conceit that the film hangs on to make the opening work that may bother some, but the tension is so good it is forgivable.
Then comes the middle part of the film, which abandons the Kane character who we have come to care about and moves to private eye John Clifford (Charles Durning, TOOTSIE) who is hunting the murderous phone caller after he has escaped from the insane asylum. This section is really lame. The Durning character is not sympathetic. The section hides information and then for no reason abandons the hiding for no reason. It establishes another character named Tracy (Colleen Dewhurst, THE DEAD ZONE) then abandons her. Plus Durning has a revenge motivation that is hard to swallow, because he is not a direct participant in the killer’s actions.
Then comes the solid ending, which reunites us with Kane’s character. The segment builds real tension, but thrusts a deus ex mechanica on the audience to resolve the conflict. The film skirts by. In principle, it’s a mess. It divides its sympathy between two characters. At times, it begins to develop the killer so well that you lose any sympathy for Durning’s character and start to empathize with the villain.
However, the opening sequence is too good to just brush off. It was copied and perfected even better in the first SCREAM film. The ending saves the film from being almost unwatchable by reminding us of the great opening. In the end, viewers could really just watch the Carol Kane moments and get a pretty good short thriller. As a whole, the film barely works at all.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
