Columbia Pictures | Release Date: October 26, 1979 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
58
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 7 Critic Reviews
Positive:
2
Mixed:
5
Negative:
0
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75
When a Stranger Calls manages to scare the stuffing out of the audience - the film is authentically terrifying - without pouring more than a demi-carafe of gore. [22 Oct 1979]
60
Washington PostJames L. Rowe Jr.
Director Fred Walton sets the audience up early for a 20-minute reign of terror and gracefully shocks them out of their seats in a final blitz. But he packs the middle with drawn-out dialogue and mindless series of chases and escapes that do little more tan pad the feature film into feature length. [19 Oct 1979, p.31]
50
Fred Walton, who directed Stranger, seems more skillful at orchestrating creepy atmospherics than John Carpenter was in Halloween. At the same time, he's scarcely clever or stylish enough to make Stranger a thriller worth going out of your way for. [20 Oct 1979, p.F6]