Customer Reviews

Don't Answer the Phone [VHS]

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

DON'T ANSWER THE PHONE (1979): Suffering from the memories of his abusive father, gibbering lunatic Kirk Smith is a photographer who occasionally uses the cover of his job to help locate young female victims to murder. For fun, the serial killer routinely takes part in Psychologist Lindsey Gale's call-in radio program, pretending to seek advice about his sexual obsessions. Street savvy cop Lt. McCabe and his sidekick Sgt. Hatcher attempt to identify the perpetrator of the fiendish killings with little success, at one point utilizing the powers of an incompetent psychic. During the investigation, McCabe and Gale meet and become romantically involved. Meanwhile, Smith breaks into the house of Carol, a beautiful young patient of Dr. Gale's, and tortures her before killing her. Later, he is invited into the home of prospective model Joyce. When she complains about the sick nature of some of the photographs on display in his portfolio, he tears off her clothes and strangles her on the living room couch. Her roommate enters the room in time to see her friend die, at which point she is cornered by the wildly shrieking madman, who strangles her slowly to death. McCabe and Hatcher interview Sam Gluckman, a smut peddler who identifies Smith. Hot on Smith's trail, the cops are stunned when the maniac kidnaps Gale, which suddenly makes the case very personal for McCabe. Before Smith is able to make the psychologist his next victim, McCabe frees the terrified woman and pursues the killer into a residential area. "Adios, creep!" McCabe intones, shooting the fleeing murderer repeatedly in the back. In slow motion, Smith's bullet-riddled corpse falls into a swimming pool...

This strange hodgepodge of a movie, a mixture of violent death scenes, "comedy" time-filler and pathetically incompetent dramatics, arbitrarily lurches from sequence to sequence in a fairly bewildering fashion. In fact, the narrative, such as it is, exists merely as a pretext for a series of often shocking murder scenes. The film is horribly padded with a muddled, vaguely detailed police investigation of the crimes, as well as by shots of the killer interminably walking the streets accompanied by a cheap, pulsing synth score.

Director Robert Hammer handles his chores with only perfunctory competence, but he definitely has what Pauline Kael once called (in her review of MAGNUM FORCE) "sadistic savvy." By making sure every beautiful victim is unclothed at the time of her death, Hammer deliberately gives each murder a sick, erotically charged emphasis.

Despite its overall wretchedness, the film has managed to develop a small cult thanks to the undeniably fascinating performance of Nicholas Worth, a generally fine character actor whose turn here as a shrieking, chortling, utterly deranged psychopath makes Kirk Smith one of the most memorable horror villains of the slasher era. While not exactly a "good" performance per se, Worth's extreme hamminess and undeniable charisma burn up the screen and make it all the more unfortunate that the screenwriters could not think of more interesting things for him to do in between killings.

The Rhino DVD release of DON'T ANSWER THE PHONE is an absolute abomination. Apparently an edited-for-TV print of the film was utilized for the transfer, so all hints of profanity, nudity and violence have been censored from the proceedings. The storyline is now resolutely incoherent from beginning to end. While much of Worth's performance is still intact, the fact of the matter is that with all of its "good parts" missing, this moderately entertaining sleaze fest has been rendered completely worthless.

I was totally disgusted with rhino,s version of Don,t answer the phone.All the great parts are butchered beyond belief.The violence was watered down to nothing and all you are left with are a bunch of talky parts.The reason people buy a film like this is for those exciting segments.Without that you have nothing.First of all we pay money for these products so they should not be edited.This version was like a bad tv movie.We should all get our money back from being ripped off like that.My advice is to wait until a reputable company releases this film UNCUT,and gives it the respect it deserves.

Rhino has totally butchered this old exploitation/drive in flick --do NOT buy this version. The only reason to watch this movie was to see sex and violence; all nudity and graphic violence has been edited out on this version. It has been so badly butchered it would not get an "R" rating if submitted as presented on this DVD.

Shame on Rhino, you people are obviously very sick.

This DVD is rated R, but should be rated PG. All sex and violence has pretty much been slashed. The original movie has one of the all-time great, or should I say outrageous, serial killers in Nicholas Worth, but his efforts are lost in this major disappointment. The violence is tempered by some, shall we say, sick humor. Not much else is left. I rated this DVD a 1, but only because that is the lowest rating available. DON'T BUY THIS DVD!!

Rhino cut this movie into a waste of time and money. Save yours, unless you like watching guys with there head in a stocking doing something you can't see. One star is too good for this murderd movie.

The DVD version of this movie which I just received, is totally worthless. It has had ALL the intense scenes removed. I thought the $11.88 was a low price, well it ain't even worth $0.88. DON'T BUY IT, ITS RATED "G" FOR GONE!

The original was o-kay. This version is totally censored, forget it

OK folks, I sympathize with those of you who hated this movie. It's nasty and what there is of a plot is goofy. But Nicholas Worth scares the hell out of me every time I watch this. At once smug and terrified, forceful and helpless, his whimpering panic-attack-tantrum gets right into my guts and makes me identify with this obscene morbid beefy creature.

The movie lets you learn just enough about the victims to experience their fear and pain with maximum possible sympathy and intensity, and the sarcastic detective and other incidental characters get some hilarious lines.

If you accept the goal of the movie, which is, to horrify you the viewer by forcing you to feel intimate with this infantile, onanistic killer, I bet you will admit that this movie succeeds.

Back when I first watched this film in the 90's, I liked it and remembered it because it was creepy & scared the living daylights out of me. Is the movie downright sick, perverted, disgusting, and offensive towards women? Why yes, it is. Did it make me as a female, back in college, always look behind me when walking home after dark? Heck yes, every time. It is also excellently played by Nicholas Worth, who portrays the infamous "Kirk Smith" in one of his first films (the uncut version) On with the review:

Let's start off by saying this DVD edition by Rhino isn't worth a dime; they basically chose to chop out the scenes that make the film worth watching! The sleaze, (well, they left a tad of that in), the part where Worth attacks "the other" model when posing as a photographer, the hot candle wax pouring scene, when Worth talks to himself like a wacko, the scene where the 2 cops track down the sleaze house where Kirk sells his pics, the "adios creep" scene, the vulgar language....all that's GONE in this edition. Actually, the most disappointing part of this Rhino edition is they totally butchered the ending beyond belief- the film ends with Worth attempting to kill Flo Gerrish (Dr. Lindsay Gale), and the film just cuts out....black screen.

What you do get, however, is a total nutcase psycho running loose around Hollywood (think Sunset blvd- exactly how it was back in the 70s) stalking, strangling, and raping women. After Worth becomes obsessed with an on-air female shrink who counsels drug addicts and more wackos, he starts calling into the radio station as "Ramon" and claiming of bad headaches. It's clear to the shrink, and probably anyone listening that this guy is seriously demented. In one scene, Worth finishes with a hooker and has her call into the show- then he strangles her, on air. Ok, so by now the cops are onto "Ramon", right? Well, not quite. Worth, who in his spare time cruises around Hollywood posing as a photographer, makes the fatal mistake of leaving his "portfolio" of artwork at the home where he kills off 2 models (again, this scene is deleted w. this edition). The cops trace the "portfolio" of Sicko's work back to the sleaze house, where a big dude with a cigar I would call "Bubba" sends them on Worth's path....

It's almost too late, because Worth is already on his next prey- Dr. Lindsey Gale.....

Bottom line? If you want to revisit this 80's sleaze, buy the uncut version by BCI and get your money's worth. The sleaze, effective musical score, and performance by Worth make it- well, Worth it.

Amazon should allow us to rate something as a zero, 'cause this one is.

Wow. I just received "Don't Answer the Phone", a cheap strangler movie that, nonetheless, had some pretty gorgeous women in panties and nothing else during various lead-ups to murder scenes.

Don't even THINK of buying this. Rhino should be charged with larceny for releasing this Jerry Falwell pablum. The DVD's crudely-hacked version cuts out entire scenes and even entire murder victims. The little that is shown is TV-spineless close-ups of nothing.

Is this typical Rhino? I'll avoid these creeps forever if so. How can someone even release garbage like this?

Entertainment laws need to be enacted that force loud disclaimers on the covers of badly-hacked DVD versions of anything.

I'm returning mine. Thieves.