After the hit that was "Friday the 13th", director Sean Cunningham would tackle another low-budget horror / thriller item. "A Stranger is Watching" is quite straight-forward (with its foreseeable plot turns, still it's well written), but while not as explicit (as say Friday) it nonetheless held a grimy and nasty approach and this can be attributed a lot to Rip Torn's boldly outstanding performance. He magnificently portrayed a robust, but cold and disturbing killer. The two female leads were not to be overshadowed either, as there is a stellar turn by the young girl Shawn von Schreiber and Kate Mulgrew is affably good too.
After the traumatic ordeal of watching her mother brutally raped and killed, another horrific incident occurs when Julie is kidnapped along with her father's newswoman girlfriend. The kidnapper keeps the two stored deep in the underground passages of New York's Grand central station while waiting for the ransom to be paid. But Julie starts getting visions of what happened that night when her mum was murdered and it becomes clear that her kidnapper was the one who murdered her mother and not the one she accused that's shortly facing execution.
Taken off a novel by Mary Higgins Clark, the material remains edgy and particularly compact with some running themes amongst its calculative structure. There's confidence in Cunningham's swift handling, as the atmospheric suspense is well timed (especially the cat and mouse sequences), the story is always on the move and the stark urban locations give it a gritty, down-to-earth vibe. Lalo Schifrin music is memorably multi-facet, never over-stating it but harvesting a chilling and racy kick that was dangerously sneaky. There's also durable support by James Naughton, Stephen Joyce, Barbara Baxley, Frank Hamilton, Roy Poole, Maggie Task, James Russo and a cameo by William Hickey.
After the traumatic ordeal of watching her mother brutally raped and killed, another horrific incident occurs when Julie is kidnapped along with her father's newswoman girlfriend. The kidnapper keeps the two stored deep in the underground passages of New York's Grand central station while waiting for the ransom to be paid. But Julie starts getting visions of what happened that night when her mum was murdered and it becomes clear that her kidnapper was the one who murdered her mother and not the one she accused that's shortly facing execution.
Taken off a novel by Mary Higgins Clark, the material remains edgy and particularly compact with some running themes amongst its calculative structure. There's confidence in Cunningham's swift handling, as the atmospheric suspense is well timed (especially the cat and mouse sequences), the story is always on the move and the stark urban locations give it a gritty, down-to-earth vibe. Lalo Schifrin music is memorably multi-facet, never over-stating it but harvesting a chilling and racy kick that was dangerously sneaky. There's also durable support by James Naughton, Stephen Joyce, Barbara Baxley, Frank Hamilton, Roy Poole, Maggie Task, James Russo and a cameo by William Hickey.