| |
PRODUCER: |
John Davis (I Robot, Predator, AVP: Alien vs. Predator), Wyck Godfrey (I Robot, Predator, AVP: Alien vs. Predator), Ken Lemberger (All the Kings Men) |
| |
When a Stranger Calls is based on a well known 1979 thriller entitled . . . well . . . When a Stranger Calls.
The movie begins when a high school student named Jill (Camilla Belle) is grounded for exceeding her allotted number of cell phone minutes. Her parents are making her pay off the bill by babysitting for a wealthy family in the remote mountains of Colorado. When she arrives at the palatial house, she is instructed not to bother the children because they have gone to bed. So while trying to pass the time, Jill begins to hear noises and receives disturbing phone calls from a strange man. She finally figures something is wrong when the man asks her “have you checked the children”. The police promise to trace the calls and eventually send a car out. In the meantime, as cliché as it gets; someone knocks on the door and no one is there, lights go on and off in the house, the maid disappears, a friend stops by but gets killed on her way out, and Jill runs recklessly into the woods where she is sure the strange man is. She finally gets really worried when the police call to tell her the disturbing phone calls are coming from inside the house. She grabs the children and tries to escape. Of course, he almost gets her at every turn and when she makes a break for it, the cops finally show up.
When a Stranger Calls is a typical teen horror film in nearly every respect – complete with the standard fare of “false alarms,” idiotic decisions by victims, and the ridiculously delayed arrival of help. For better or worse, though, this one is without the usual gratuitous nudity and gore. In fact, the first five minutes contains the only disturbing imagery in the film. In the latter hour and a half, the story is too bland, the acting too unconvincing, and the scenario too unrealistic to keep you awake at night, leaving the film much more startling than it is frightening. And, while the concept – a threatening caller from inside your house – is somewhat intriguing, it’s obviously a concept that has been around at least since the 1979 original. If you just want to jump out of your seat a few times and don’t mind listening to what seems like a thousand phone rings during the movie, then you might like When a Stranger Calls. Most, however, will realize it’s a wrong number from the beginning.
|
