Carla, a young clairvoyant, sees visions of a serial strangler at large in her city. She tells this to the police investigator who's engaged to her cousin Joan, but he's a skeptic. This angers Joan, and she soon takes up with a suave doctor who's been treating her terminally ill uncle. When Carla sees the doctor, she cautions Joan that he's the strangler from her visions, but her warning is shrugged-off.
This virtually uncharted little South African precursor to the similar(but far better) thriller THE EYES OF LAURA MARS is relatively well made on a low budget, and perfomances from the cast are roundly acceptable. Sadly, it's a piddling little whiffle of a movie with far too much expository backchat, and too little action to keep it lively. The oblique "surprise" ending is pretty weak, as well, leaving many key matters unresolved.
BAIT may be of minor interest to a few dauntless "proto-slasher" cinema completists, but it's a laggard 80 minutes which could be far better spent.
4/10.
