Senteur As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

Ogosmith Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Billie Morin This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

Karlee The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

lost-in-limbo Tony Lo Bianco (more known for his acting, especially in one of my Larry Cohen favorites 'God Told Me too') directs a mechanically snug and customary stark urban-set murder mystery thriller that throws in a dose of gratuitous nudity and psychotic violence that also has it dipping in to the low-brow exploitative market. Nonetheless it still demonstrates a low-budget made-for-television feel (due to Bianco's plain, but enduring style), even though its brimming with a toughly rough grittiness brought across by its seamy backdrop. After being drowned out by a wretch song through the beginning credits (yep it's rather bad!), it actually gets better to cement an conundrum of mystery led by an convincingly collected, but dreary Ian McShane as the detective's chief suspect the doorman of the apartment building where the viciously random murders are occurring.The problem here is that the material just paints him too obviously as a red herring to be the one, but the twist (and you know its coming) to who is the actual killer had me fooled (and it's an exaggeratedly ill-advised revelation that comes from nowhere and had me thinking of a late 80s slasher effort), as I had someone else in my sights as the culprit. The busy, pictorial layout has numerous character dramas (with even the police getting involved) and suspicious dabbling that can cause the lumpy pace to lull about at times with distracting details that don't really add anything and go on to undermine its attempts of consolidating tension. Not helping either was the constant use of false jumps and lead ups, which more often lead to the real one. It's the cryptic nature of the story along with the soberly first base performances by the likes of Mike Connors, Anne Archer, Leon Iassc Kennedy, John Heard, Val Avery, Carrie Nye and Phyllis Hyman in a colorful cameo that make-up for its wayward spells. However it opens up with lasting suspense in the dying stages, but the deaths for most part appear off-screen and those we do see are theatrically staged with sudden, but clunky force. The musical score is old-fashioned, but over-cooked which makes it hard to switch-off.Not perfect, but this old-hat, stone-cold premise manages to truly hold you there for it's outrageous, if tatty final.

lazarillo This early 80's slasheresque movie is pretty bad really, but I kind of liked it for some reason. It involves a number of murders in a swanky high rise building. The killings are investigated by a male and female cop, and the main suspect is the reddest herring imaginable--a doorman and aspiring way off-Broadway actor. There is some blood, a lot of gratuitous nudity, and that sleazy urban ambiance of the early 80's also featured in movies like "Eyes of a Stranger", "Windows", as well as genuinely disturbing flicks like "Maniac" and "Nightmare in a Damaged Brain". It was one of the last of the gritty, downbeat 70's style exploitation flicks before the happy fascism of the Reagan era and before Rudy Guliani turned 42nd Street into Disneyland.The movie was directed by obscure cult actor Tony LoBianca who appeared in "The Honeymoon Killers" and "God Told Me To". He never directed another movie, and I'm not sure how he ever came to direct this one. The female lead is Anne Archer, who was later in "Fatal Attraction" (and I'd rather watch this movie any day than that overrated and reactionary piece of crap). It's pretty hard to find (I bought a used PAL video in Buenos Aires for about 30 cents I think), but not a COMPLETE waste of time if you stumble across it.

gridoon Purists or experts might disagree, but I believe "Too Scared To Scream" is an earnest attempt by the filmmakers to create an American version of the Italian "giallo" thrillers. Although the violence isn't particularly graphic, the film plays like a murder mystery in which you think you know who the murderer is, but you can't be sure until the last frame. It does have its flaws (some obvious red herrings, some ridiculous "fake scares"), but it offers a few tense moments, an unexpected (if far-fetched) conclusion, and good performances by most of the cast (especially by the man who plays the chief suspect). A good choice for mystery fans. (**)

Angelus-16 This TV-ish stalker flick has a few entertaining moments but is mostly marred by boring dialogue and useless scenes that don't mean anything. A gloved killer knocks off the rich and arty residents of a Manhattan skyrise bringing in a couple of detectives who suspect British poetically-charged doorman McShane who's mute, wheelchair bound mother reminds us of 'Psycho' a tad... The okay premise is wasted by misusing the setting and barely touching on the supporting characters resulting in a total lack of sympathy for anyone, and when the killer is finally revealed, it borders on prejudice... A little more imagination would have been nice.