Play Misty for Me

This is quite an impressive, very 70s looking psycho-thriller that is sure to please.

Clint Eastwood plays Dave Garver, a radio DJ in southern California. One night, a woman calls requesting that he "Play Misty for me." Later, he meets the woman at a bar he goes to often, and they go back to her house together and make love. The next morning, he leaves, figuring it was just a one-night stand, but when he gets home, the woman, Evelyn Draper (Jessica Walter) shows up with groceries and starts to make herself at home. Dave decides to go with it, and later sees that his old girlfriend, Tobie Williams (Donna Mills), is back in town, and the two become close again. But Evelyn won't go away, and continues to follow Dave everywhere, and starts to get viciously jealous of Tobie. And as Dave and Tobie's relationship forms, Evelyn becomes angry and violent, and eventually, murderous, and Dave must find some way to stop her before she ruins his life, and potentially, kills him.

A very creepy movie. Jessica Walter is beyond convincing as the jealous psycho lover, and Clint Eastwood proves that he doesn't just do Dirty Harry movies. Donna Mills is also quite good as the innocent girlfriend. The movie implies and foreshadows a lot, making everything even scarier. But the best scene in the whole movie is the knife attack on the maid, Birdie. That scene competes with the shower scene in "Psycho" as one of the most shocking in film history. The way the camera darts and swings around, and Birdie's screams as she struggles and fights to get away, all add up to one of the scariest scenes I've every seen. The climax is quite good, if not executed a little too quickly, but what led to it was shocking enough to overshadow it.

All in all, a great film that I would definitely recommend.

In the city of Carmel, the popular disc-jockey David Garver (Clint Eastwood) has one night stand with Evelyn Draper (Jessica Walter), a strange he met in a bar after his show. The woman, indeed a deranged obsessed fan, stalks David and threatens his life, his girl-friend Tobie Williams (Donna Mills), his friends and even his job.

The debut of Clint Eastwood as director could not be better. This low budget and low paced movie has a simple, but frightening story, which was ripped off at least in the famous "Fatal Attraction" and the teen version "Swimfan". The magnificent landscape and locations in the beautiful city of Carmel, where Clint Eastwood was elected Major many years later, are another attraction. The performance of Jessica Walters is awesome, changing naturally her behavior from a sweet to an aggressive person, really incorporating her character. Clint Eastwood is very cool, as usual, and Donna Mills very gorgeous. I like the unusual break of tension adopted when Evelyn is arrested and Dave and Tobie's routine returns to normal, dating, going to festival, making love, increasing the suspense after the twist point. I do not recall how many times I have seen "Play Misty for Me", a classic and one of the best thrillers of the 70's. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Perversa Paixão" ("Wicked Passion")

This was "Fatal Attraction" 16 years before that famous movie was made.

The problem with this tense drama was credibility. There are several instances where just about everyone with a brain would avoid trouble by doing the sensible thing....except the character in here, of course. Also, being honest is the obvious thing to do here and, of course, that's not done either.

Nevertheless, it's a taut thriller with Jessica Walter doing a great job playing a nutcase stalker "Evelyn Draper." I also enjoyed watching Donna Mills. An appealing actress, and not just because of a pretty face, I wonder she didn't do more films? After this movie, it's been almost all television roles for her.

So-so mono sound and poor picture quality helped me eventually trade my VHS copy in but, with a nice DVD transfer now available, I might check this movie out again. Clint Eastwood, the male lead here, has rarely been in a boring movie, and this is no exception.

This movie, I suppose, was the first nice-guy-being-stalked-by-psycho-female thriller. And it's quite damn good. Modern audiences might feel the film was too low-key, but I found it very suspenseful. This proves you don't need eerie music (there's very little score on the soundtrack) and continuous gore to create suspense. Jessica Walter is terrifying--maybe not as terrifying as Glenn Close in "Fatal Attraction," but she comes pretty close. It's fun--and somewhat hilarious--to see Clint Eastwood as a young man with LOTS of hair. This was his first directorial effort, and he did a fine job. Over 30 years, the premise has become all-too-familiar, so unfortunately the story is predictable. Maybe 1970's audiences found it more shocking. But I was able to predict who would die and when. Nevertheless, I still found "Play Misty For Me" very entertaining and very well-acted. But what was with that jazz concert scene? Clint definitely should've left that on the cutting room floor.

My score: 7 (out of 10)

Too-careful shocker directed and starring Clint Eastwood involves a radio disc-jockey who gets seductive requests by telephone for the song "Misty"--he later meets the overly-friendly female fan and they share a fling, but she 'won't be ignored'. Tense thriller may have been the starting point for Adrian Lyne's "Fatal Attraction", though this one is far less slick. Sometimes an actor is so good in a role that it's impossible to see them as anyone else later in their career; such is the case with Jessica Walter, who nails this part of the psychotic woman--and seems to embody instability itself! Several scenes go on too long, the climax is so dark visually it is nearly incoherent, and there's a jazz festival interlude (and a romantic montage with Eastwood and Donna Mills) that feels like padding, but the central situation is unsettling, well-crafted and well-played. As for Walter, she had a tough time shaking off the affects left behind with this role, which of course is both pro and con. *** from ****