When A Stranger Calls (2006)

[MacGuffin]

Trailer here.

Release Date: February 3rd, 2006

Cast: Camilla Belle, Katie Cassidy, Brian Geraghty, Tessa Thompson

Writer: Jake Wade Wall

Director: Simon West

Premise: While babysitting, a high school student is terrorized by a stranger who calls her, asking "have you checked the children lately?" The police eventually notify her the calls are coming from inside the house.

[matt35mm]

Pretty shitty looking.

This would be a good idea for a movie if not every single person had already heard the story before.

But yes, she is pretty.

[grand theft sparrow]

I can't wait to find out what half-assed explanation they came up with to explain a teenage girl having access to a car but not a working cell phone in the 21st century.

But yes, she is pretty.

She's got 80s Jennifer Connelly eyebrows though... but not the boobies to match.

This would be a good idea for a movie if not every single person had already heard the story before.

I've never seen the original because everyone always mentions the "It's coming from inside the house" bit.  At that point, it's like "WOW!  That would have made shit the couch if I didn't know it was going to happen now!"  So I haven't bothered.  It seems like it's the number 2 most freely spoiled movie of all time after Citizen Kane.

[matt35mm]

But yes, she is pretty.

She's got 80s Jennifer Connelly eyebrows though... but not the boobies to match.

I don't care.

And everyone knows the story because it's a popular scary story to tell, at sleepovers and stuff.  You can even integrate the house that you're telling the story in, if you like.  And even if someone didn't know the story before seeing the trailer, they do now.

The whole movie just looks like a big burrito of stuff that's been done before, wrapped in poor explanations to ridiculous situations, smothered in stupid sauce.  Not one single original element.

[Pubrick]

unless the stranger is robert blake, this is already the worst movie of 2006.

[Gamblour.]

hmm this is so bland and done that I have nothing to say. I wont' see it.

[bonanzataz]

do you think this will have a sequel 20 years down the line where camilla belle plays a counselor at a college where she helps a traumatized girl that suffered a similar experience in which the killer that was stalking this traumatized girl when she was a babysitter years earlier now paints himself into the walls and watches her every move? that would be cool.

[MacGuffin]

Pretty much a standard by-the-numbers thriller, with only a few moments of intrigue. The main problem with the story is that the red-herrings are explained at the beginning with the wife's tour for the sitter. "Here's the cat [who will give you a couple fake scares]; there's a maid who lives upstairs [who you will think is making the noises and turning off the alarm]; and out there in the guest house is our son [who will give you a false sense of security]." The main scares are the kind where the volume for the stingers has to be turned up to eleven.

But I was very impressed with Camilla Belle and her character. She's a smart, somewhat tough young woman with just the right amount of vulnerability for this kind film (compare her to the dumb blonde friend and you can see the difference). A nice moment is when she's so nervous, the fireplace poker is rattling in her hand against the door, and yet she doesn't make the mistakes where you're yelling at the characters about how stupid they are. She's a nice match with Sydney from the Scream series.