Retro Slashers

TV reporter Jane (Lauren Tewes from The Love Boat) suspects her neighbor Stanley Herbert (King Frat‘s John DiSanti) is the serial killer/rapist terrorizing Miami.  Instead of going to the police with her suspicions, Jane decides to stalk Stanley.  She breaks into his apartment, steals a shoe, and harrasses Stanley with menacing phone calls.  Jane is so busy playing Nancy Drew that she forgets about protecting her deaf, dumb, and blind sister Tracy (Jennifer Jason Leigh).   When Jane goes out to snoop for more clues Stanley pays Tracy a little visit.

Eyes of A Stranger is a suspenseful little slasher from Ken Wiederhorn, the director of Shock Waves, King Frat, and Return of the Living Dead Part II.  The film is divided into three parts.  The first section is like a traditional slasher.  A mysterious stalker terrorizes a woman with creepy phone calls, decapitates her boyfriend with a meat cleaver, leaves the head in a fish tank, and then attacks the woman.  After the first murders the film switches the slasher norms so that the killer is now the one stalked by a woman.  The murders during this middle section are far less graphic but more realistic and disturbing.  The final section is a nerve racking game of cat and mouse with deaf, dumb, and blind Tracy trapped in her apartment by the extremely pissed off Stanley.

What makes Eyes of a Stranger so much fun to watch are the performances by the three lead actors.  John DiSanti is chilling as the killer.  He looks like just a regular, plain type of guy you might pass in a store and never give a second thought.  DiSanti’s scenes with Jennifer Jason Leigh are bloody amazing.  At times he seems like a child playing with a new toy, only this new toy is a helpless woman.  Leigh does a great job portraying the severely handicapped Tracy.  Her scenes with DiSanti really crank up the suspense and tension levels.  Lauren Tewes starts the film as one of those champions of justice do-gooder reporters, CNN’s Nancy Grace probably stole her shtick from Tewes’ performance, but changes once she becomes the stalker.  It’s almost like she’s addicted to calling and taunting a serial killer.  And there’s a strong sexual undercurrent running through Tewes’ phone scenes.  Watch the way she smokes her cigarette and falls back on the bed after one of the calls and you’ll see what I mean.

The gore effects are handled by Tom Savini, but they are pretty tame compared to the work he was doing for Maniac and The Prowler around the same time.  The slit throat kills are good and unnerving but the decapitation looks a little wonky.  We do get to see one of Savini’s  “I just got my head chopped off so my hands have spasms” moments made famous in Friday the 13th.  A poster for Dawn of the Dead, shown as a Tom Savini in-joke, can be seen on a movie marquee.  Another in-joke involves characters watching Wiederhorn’s Shock Waves during the first stalk and slash scene.  One guy ends up in a fish tank, well parts of him anyway, just like a victim in Shock Waves.

Eyes of a Stranger is a suspenseful, sometimes sleazy, slasher that plays around with viewers expectations.  John DiSanti and Jennifer Jason Leigh are great as killer and helpless victim, respectively.  Screenwriters Mark Jackson (a.k.a Ron Kurz who worked on the first four Friday the 13ths) and Eric L. Bloom have created a good slasher but hurt the film by including some tasteless rape scenes and one brutal flashback.  The film doesn’t need these scenes and it takes away from overall enjoyment of watching Eyes of a Stranger.  Despite these unnecessarily dips into sleazy exploitation this is a slasher worth tracking down.

See larger image Eyes of a Stranger (DVD) Starring: Lauren Tewes, Jennifer Jason Leigh, John DiSanti, Peter DuPre, Gwen Lewis Rating: R (Restricted) List Price: $14.98 USD New From: $1.89 In Stock Used from: $1.46 In Stock Release date September 25, 2007.