The Caller

(1987) The Caller PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER/ SCIENCE-FICTION

It opens with the Madolyn Smith character leaving with some money to the gas station attendant after filling the range rover up with gas. And when she leaves the gas station, someone's hand is seen grabbing money after she has left. And by the time she comes home, which happens to be a cottage in the middle of the nowhere, someone appears to be watching her. Bringing packages in, one of the odd packages she brings inside is a hat box that has something dripping at the bottom. She first makes a call to her daughter and as soon as someone knocks on her door, it happens to be the character played by Malcolm McDowell, telling her that he has a flat and wanting to use her telephone. At first, she is reluctant since she says she is expecting somebody to show up for dinner as it was in the middle of the night. And it was at this point the mind games begins when both the Madolyn Smith and the Malcolm McDowell characters begin questioning one another's motives and making suggestions the person may have or might have done, ending with a twist the reason the movie is called "the Caller", and it is not what one would think.

A two person performance of Madolyn Smith and Malcolm McDowell as one is attempting to figure out the other from one day after the next. The ending rivals to anything from the "Twilight Zone" which requires some thought.

These weird, gapless phone calls; this plastic artificiality; the completely unnatural emotional reactions: are these evidence that what we're witnessing is mental illness, something supernatural, or "just 80s movie things"? Only at this moment in history could that full range of possibilities exist.

And that gamut is what's going to keep you gripped in the oddest possible way. You can never simply guess or second-guess what's going on, because you always know that in 80s cinema this could be a representation of something more mundane. From that possibility, many more can spring. Your mind becomes a field of spinning plates: perhaps it's a weird mating dance between people who've lost their spark, someone/everyone is a psychopath, someone/everyone has memory loss, the list goes on.

You are absolutely never going to guess the twist, and how you react to that revelation will largely rest on how much you enjoyed the ridiculous build-up. If you allowed the campness to wash over you, the ending will be an absurd delight but if it was trying your patience then the ending is going to make you rage.

There's something particularly adorable about the way this film clearly thinks it's playing a classy two-hander worthy of the stage. I mean, it's not. It's absolutely not. Awww, but bless its heart.

It's one of those movies which is progressively making you question if You are going mad / not clever enough to understand any freakin thing in this picture. Then something happens at the very end, and you go A-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-!..!.!...

...and you are probably supposed to re-watch now actually getting the point of every happening and strange set dressings.

Gotta admit the intriguing third "sci-fi" tag made me watching it in the end, and i was right: it is not just an inconsequential "stranger from the street keeps a naive poor soul on her toes for an hour" type of flick.

But don't ask me what type of flick it really is either, because i'm not sure if we are even expected to fully understand what is going on. All i say is, the film sorta hints at the possibility that The Girl is either the last person alive on Earth, or she is one of the handful of "lucky ones" left, being tormented.

I'm yet to re-watch some time, maybe i will be able to rate higher once i saw these two acting the way they do, now in a different light.

Strange, gripping drama for the first 90% of the movie. McDowell plays his character with a weird calm intensity that keeps your eyes glued to him. Madolyn Smith-Osborne, a terrific actress here and someone who I never heard of, plays a woman who looks like she's about to come unhinged at any moment.

Part of the problem with this very dialogue-intense movie is that it builds up to such a dramatic climax that it's impossible to keep it going through any explanation of what's really going on. And the explanation really cheapens things.

What's really great about this movie is the interplay between the two (and only two) characters. In some parts it's brilliant. I wish I had stopped watching some time before Smith-Osborne got all her points, however.

The suspense of this movie made me late for work, when I got to work I discovered everyone else was late due to this movie being so suspenseful! The movie description tells you all you need to know. The end is something you must see only because I did, and it's only fair you do too. Will say this though; I didn't see it coming. There really isn't much more to say and I don't want to spoil this for any of you so I will most certainly not do that. The acting is decent, and the direction is very good so this is not by any means a waste of time. I say that because I know this will be the initial reaction of most people.