The Invention of Caller ID

When a Stranger Calls is one of those mild genre classics that has somehow eluded my 31 years on this planet. Despite my mother's constant quoting of "The call is coming from INSIDE THE HOUSE!" at several opportune moments in my life, I just never got around to Fred Walton’s 1979‘s's thriller.

Quick Plot: Everybody's favorite sugar-voiced dame Carol Kane plays Jill, a young babysitter whose charges are fast asleep when she reports for duty and supposed to stay that way all night. Before you can say Jamie Lee, Jill is stuck fielding creepy phone calls asking, very simply, "Have you checked the children?"

Now most responsible babysitters would take the deep breather's words to heart, but since Jill was told that the kids should not be disturbed, we'll give her the benefit of the doubt, especially after a police officer on the line assures her that since the door is locked, everything will be fine.

Ahhhh, the 70s.

When a Stranger Calls is probably most well-known for its opening, and it's easy to see why. Director Fred Walton sets a simple, incredibly tense tone as Jill sits in dim lighting, a villainous telephone never too far from her shaky reach. From those first twenty minutes, When a Stranger Calls earns its place as one of the decade’s most memorable thrillers.

It’s a shame that the rest of the film can’t sustain that energy. Charles Durning (not to be confused with Charles S. Dutton, unless you’re me and can’t EVER remember which is which) takes over as John Clifford, the policeman who collared the phone killer, an insane Brit named Curt Duncan. Seven years later, Duncan has escaped and John is on the case as a private detective to track him down. The film rotates between John’s investigation and Duncan’s hobo-like existence as the latter spends his days hitting on Colleen Dewhurst and getting into bar fights.

This isn’t uninteresting. Played by then-ailing actor Tony Beckley, Duncan is not your typical horror slasher. He’s scrawny and weak-looking, the kind of character you might smell from two cars down on the subway and walk a little closer to the street to avoid on the sidewalk. On one hand, he’s far less intimidating in nature than the kind of mad man we usually meet in these kinds of films. Made just one year after Halloween changed the film industry, When a Stranger Calls isn’t yet a slave to the formula that would come to define the genre. While Duncan is somewhat easily knockdownable, he’s also unsettlingly real.

The downside of not working with an established formula is that sometimes, you just don’t know where to go. The film starts out as a taut thriller, transitions into grizzled detective yarn, flirts with psychological drama, and finally ends on a note akin to Lifetime horror. 

High Points

Enough can’t be said about this film’s opening, which was incredibly tense even if I knew what the final punchline was going to be. I could only imagine how effective the reveal would have been for fresh eyes in 1979

Low Points

Focusing on three different characters--Durning’s detective, Duncan the killer, and Kane’s Jill--could certainly work, but the film spreads out the coverage so oddly that it’s hard to ever latch onto whose story this is

Lessons Learned

It's nice to offer your babysitter free reign of the fridge, but emphasizing that it includes low-FAT yogurt might be taken the wrong way

The best thing about having Charles Durning pursue you on foot is that even if you haven’t eaten in a few days, you’ll probably be able to outrun him pretty easily

When someone keeps asking you if you’ve checked the children, maybe it’s time to, oh I don’t know, CHECK the children

Rent/Bury/Buy

When a Stranger Calls isn’t necessarily a genre classic, but it’s well worth a visit if you’ve never seen it. Though the opening sets a tone that the rest can’t come close to living up to, the film features strong, interesting performances from the type of cast you just won’t normally find in this type of story. Director Fred Walton (who went on to work primarily in television movies with the affectionate exception of April Fool’s Day) knows how to build suspense, and while it’s not maintained in a typical way, When a Stranger Calls still manages to make for some tense and worthwhile viewing.

What, am I funny like a clown? Do I AMUSEMENT you?

Few gimmicks are easier to pull off in a horror movie than menacing clowns. Plant one on your poster and you can guarantee a few automatic rentals, at least 10% of which will come from me. Hence today’s feature, 2009’s Amusement, clinched its way onto my television when it hit Instant Watch.

Quick Plot: Opening credits introduce three lovely young ladies poised for big things: Tabitha (most likely to succeed), Lisa (most likely to be famous), and Shelby (most likely to shine, whatever that means). Last is a weird little boy with mental issues, untitled but we’ll call him Most Likely to Remind People of Michael Myers.

Shelby, now grown and tired, is driving home to Ohio with her boyfriend, a young man who dreams, it would seem, of joining a highway convoy. Granted I don’t travel much by car, but are convoys some sort of secret Skulls-like fraternity that guarantees true happiness? Anyway, as you can guess, this one is filled with menace, here in the nicely twisted form of a kidnapping-happy roadster.

Following the mildly effective first story, we move on to Tabitha (Satan’s Little Helper charmer Katheryn Winnick) as she embarks in spending the evening with her moppy-haired cousins. And for whatever reason, their collection of awful evil very terrible clown dolls. A storm is raging, one first-shift babysitter missing, mysterious hooded man spotted, and giant awful evil very terrible clown doll is creaking away in a rocking chair, waiting for the perfect moment to leap to life and hunt the pretty blond.

Lastly, we move to Lisa, who worries when her good-girl roommate never comes home and hunts her down with her health inspector boyfriend. They end up in a Frankensteinian hotel headed by a little weirdo, who naturally....well you see where it’s all going.

Amusement is an odd little dish, one made with a lot of genuinely good ingredients that simply never got cooked long enough. The basic premise of following three women as they get taken by a psycho is something new, and the fact that each story has a completely different approach helps. The opening offers a neat car chase, the second, a tried and true clown hunt, and the third, a nice stalking through a funhouse. All three actresses are adequate, with Winnick proving the most charming. 

On the other hand, Amusement is also something of a mess. We don’t really know the villain well enough to ever really be scared of him, as a single childhood flashback doesn’t really give us much to fear. Ending all the buildup with one more stalk-chase sequence feels lazy, especially when we reach a point where it seems clear who will emerge the survivor. The film has plenty of genuine originality but unfortunately, not a good enough screenplay to make it work.

High Points

Though we know how it has to eventually end, the prolonged scene with the life-sized clown doll (or is it???) is fairly effective (at least if you’re naturally uneasy with giant life-sized clown dolls)

Low Points

As stated earlier, a script that doesn’t really have the energy to tie its pieces together

Lessons Learned

Entertainers and performers are also known as lovers of the laugh

There’s an art to a good convoy, and it apparently includes introducing yourself awkwardly at rest stops

Most FBI interrogations are not held in abandoned drafty warehouses with moving walls and no cell phone reception. Remember this when calling in on your job

Rent/Bury/Buy

Amusement is not by any means a good film, but it has a little more going for it than a lot of other slick direct-to-DVD modern horrors. Director John Simpson can clearly stage a few good scenes, though tying them together just never seemed to happen in Jake Wade “The Hitcher AND When a Stranger Calls remakes writer” Wall’s script. Sure, for a $10 million budget, a better story could have been told, but it makes for an entertaining enough 85 minutes of your mild attention. It’s no Drive-Thru (really what is? Other than Drive-Thru, which you should totally stop everything for and go watch immediately), but it’s a decent little horror that passed my morning with mild suspense.

Now go watch Drive-Thru.