Don't Answer The Phone! (1980)

Title: Don't Amswer The Phone

Release Date: February 29th, 1980

Tagline: "He'll know you're alone."

Don't Answer The Phone (1980) is a low-budget crime drama with stalk-and-kill elements.

Plot
Former Vietnam vet and photographer Kirk Smith is a crazed killer who stalks the streets of Los Angeles, picking up young women and strangling them in lurid fashion. He repeatedly contacts Dr. Lindsay Gale, the psychologist on a radio show. He targets Dr. Gale's patients, commits a murder while on the phone to her show (forcing her to listen to the victim's cries), and eventually goes after Dr. Gale herself. Two goofy policemen track him down. - from wiki

Villain
A vietnam veteran and photographer, Kirk Smith is a mysoginistic psychotic serial killer.
 * Nicholas Worth as Kirk Smith

Review
Don't Answer the Phone is yet another film from the late 70s and early 80s about a psychotic, demented, socially awkward killer who brutalizes women because of his "problems" - whatever those problems might be. This time around we have a muscular, fat Vietnam vet who was never good enough for his father butcher pretty girls just after they have stripped from their little clothing. Nicolas Worth plays the wheezing, maniacal killer with a bizarre almost interesting quality. He is not a good actor yet is able to hold your attention throughout. I wish I could say something pleasant about the rest of the cast, but none of the rest are very competent. The police detectives who are looking for Worth - one which falls in love with the pretty radio psychiatrist that can shed light on the killer's identity - were particularly bad. The girls are pretty but the misogynistic flair devoted to their deaths is particularly degrading and unpleasant. The film is at least not overtly gory and had me interested until the end. The story was compelling enough and Worth is worth a look if nothing else.

19 December 2005 | by BaronBl00d (baronbl00d@aol.com) (NC)

Credits

 * James Westmoreland as Lt. Chris McCabe
 * Ben Frank as Sgt. Hatcher
 * Flo Lawrence as Dr. Lindsay Gale
 * Nicholas Worth as Kirk Smith
 * Denise Galik as Lisa
 * Stan Haze as Adkins
 * Gary Allen as John Feldon
 * Michael D. Castle as Lab Man
 * Pamela Jean Bryant as Sue Ellen
 * Ted Chapman as Man in Bar
 * Chris Wallace as Psychic Von Hammensveld
 * Dale Kalberg as Nurse
 * Deborah Leah Land as Police Woman
 * Tom Lasswell as Police Psychiatrist
 * Mike Levine as Gary Markov
 * Chuck Mitchell as Sam Gluckman
 * Victor Mohica as Ventura
 * Susanne Severeid as Hooker
 * Paula Warner as Carol
 * Hugh Corcoran as Wino
 * Gail Jensen as Joyce
 * Joyce Ann Jodan as Roommate
 * Corinne Cook as Rikki
 * Ellen Kay Karsten as Hooker
 * Havoc Oliver as Hooker
 * David Osterhout as Policeman
 * Peter Fain as Policeman
 * Jon Greene as Policeman
 * Robin Oliver as Dope Dealer
 * Shirley Handelsman as Nurse's Mother
 * Don Lake as Man in Plastic
 * Eileen Castle as Neighbor
 * Danny Disner as Boyfriend
 * James Dunaway as Fred at Radio Station