d_m_s
Found a very low quality version on youtube. Thought it was going to be a creepy 70's horror but this was not a horror film at all. Or much of a thriller. It was more of a drama about rape. However, I could only bear 20 minutes before giving up because of the terrible acting, the lack of anything happening and the really, really slow pacing.Every scene dragged.All the characters were dull. The storyline was uneventful.
Toronto85
A young high school student begins getting creepy phone calls which eventually leads to her being stalked in 'Are You in the House Alone?". Gail Osborne is a sweet teenage girl who begins going out with classmate Steve. Eventually, she gets a phone call from an anonymous person who does the whole heavy breathing routine. It gets worse from there as Gail gets a note in her locker stating "I'm watching you". We get our list of suspects early on... is it the creepy photography teacher, Gail's current boyfriend or her ex boyfriend? Gail takes a babysitting job in town and that's when the stalker gets close and sadly Gail is raped by this person. We know who did it, and the rest of the film shows Gail trying to prove this person did this to her.'Are You in the House Alone' is actually an important film for it's time as it tackles tough topics such a rape and women's rights. It isn't so much a horror film (like the title might make it seem) as it is a suspense/mystery movie. We spend a lot of the film trying to figure out who the stalker is. Once we find out the identity of the person, it's hard to watch Gail have to prove it to her closest friend and even the courts/police. Some of the stalking scenes were REALLY well done, and add creepiness to the movie.The acting was very well done from Kathleen Beller, Scott Colomby, Robin Mattson and a young Dennis Quaid. Where the film lacks is it's pacing. It drags on quite a bit, and focuses a lot of the time on Gail's family issues and her father who's been recently laid off of his job. Good performances by her parents Blythe Danner and Tony Bill. I recommend seeing this 70's made for TV film for sure. It's only ever been released on VHS, but is online as well. It's a slower moving movie, but definitely has it's moments7/10
christopher-underwood
A late 70s TV movie, that whilst not particularly original, is tightly told and most engaging. It is surprising watching this just over thirty years on just how much the social view of sex, sexuality and rape has changed. One central suggestion here is that the main defence will be that only a virgin can be raped. An attitude we now assume only applies in country areas of such countries as India or Pakistan. But this is modern sophisticated USA, and the other social factor this film raises is that of the protected moneyed class, depicted so devastatingly well later in Brian Yuzn'a 'Society'. The film tells us of the main event early on and then flashbacks to give us the lead up and aftermath. Watching it I wasn't sure this was a good idea but it works astonishingly well with much tension and suspense. Kathleen Beller is excellent as the wider eyed victim and a young Dennis Quad does well in one of his very first films.
Robert J. Maxwell
It has all the trappings of a bad movie about high school students, their loves, intrigues, and murders, but it's a little better than that. Poor Kathleen Beller, a pretty student at Oldfield High, starts getting mysterious notes saying things like, "I'm watching you." If that weren't unnerving enough, the phone calls begin. It all finally ends in her being raped, rather decorously. I had the wrong villain picked out. I could have sworn it would turn out to be the encouraging but slightly out-of-focus photography teacher.It's not a slasher movie. There's no blood. Nobody threatens anybody else with an ax. It essentially a drawn-out story of Beller and the conundrums she faces regarding sex, family disputes, the threatening phone calls, her talent at photography, and whatnot.A lot depends on Beller. She's in almost every scene. And she's adequate -- no more than that. She has an effective pout. Neither she nor anyone else has any scenes in which they explode with emotion. She's attractive in a babyish way and has wavy burnt-carmine hair that's really LONG, like down to her sacroiliac, the kind of soft mane any normal man would want to run barefoot through. Her boy friend, Tony Bill, has even features, and that's it. Ditto for Beller's Dad, who should never be promoted out of hair spray for men commercials.The best performance is unquestionably from Blythe Danner. Her big blue eyes and ash blond hair aside, she's able to do something original with even small moments of distress or concern, and it makes much of the rest of the cast look as if they're auditioning for parts. Dennis Quaid has an important role but doesn't do much with it, partly because it's not written that way. He has only a few lines and is asked to do nothing but smirk or look puzzled. He was to improve mightily over the next few years.I don't know that the film deserves too much acting talent. The director, Walter Graumann, must have once read a book of formulas for directors. Let's see. There's the camera zooming in for a choker close up when someone is about to say something important or express an emotion deeper than indifference.Twice, Beller, the helpless victimized young girl, is quietly attending to something and an unexpected event takes place -- a door swings open without warning, or a figure appears out of the darkness -- and she leaps to her feet and gasps loudly. I guess someone forgot the musical sting that usually accompanies these shocks.The camera has a habit of taking the point of view of the miscreant -- the monster, the murderer, the rapist, the voyeur. I don't know why this meme has infected the industry. Yes, it serves to hide the identity of the heavy, but it also forces the audience into the position of identifying with the person who is about to do wrong. The device was much less offensive in "Rear Window." Final cliché: After the rape, Beller wakes up in the hospital, bruised and deflowered, surrounded by loving family, doctors, and police. They all ask her, "Who did this?" And, as is WAY too often the case, the victim breaks down and begins sobbing gibberish. "Nobody will believe me anyway," she finally gasps out. I'll skip the legal improbabilities that follow.I'm being kind of harsh on the movie not because it's so terrible but because with a little imagination and talent it could have been better than it is. Those family disputes, for instance, are an irrelevant distraction. Much is made of Dad's being laid off and hiding it from Beller to "protect her." Mom, with her part-time job showing houses, is holding everything together. But the movie has little sympathy for the parents. Instead, as Beller finally tells them, they should stop treating her like a baby.Nice photography in joyous color. The sky is always a blazing blue. There are few spooky night-time scenes. Everybody is middle-class or better. They drive some sporty machines, take fencing classes, and if things don't work out at Oldfield High, the parents send them back East to private boarding schools. How nice for them, he said, in an envious froth.
