Close Calls

Lasted about half an hour to watch this. I hardly ever give poor rating to even bad horror movies nut had decided not to waste any more time Pity the movie was not around when I was 14 - i would have had surely watched it till the end focusing more on girl's curves than cheeze plot (figuratively & literally). Good effort in 2017 to make this movie look like it was made in 80's but this one still can hardly compete with even clap-trap stories of the 80's. You'd better of watching Michael Jackson's Thriller a few times to sober up from this "Close Calls" of 2017.

I must admit that I was initially intrigued by this 2017 horror/thriller movie's cover/poster, as it felt like something very retro and taking me back to the 1980s horror movies that I grew up on.

And I hadn't heard about the movie prior to sitting down to watch it, so I didn't know what the movie was about, nor did I know what I was in for. But hey, a horror movie with a cover such as the one it had, what could possibly go wrong?

Well, I suppose the utter lack of a proper storyline and the atrocious lack of anything worthwhile and interesting. I managed to endure a numbing 42 minutes of the ordeal that is known as "Close Calls" and then I saw that there was about 1 hour and 20 minutes to go of this boring heap of a stinker, and I just gave up. In the 42 minutes that I suffered through nothing, and I mean that literally, nothing of any interest had transpired. Well, unless you consider a scantily dressed young girl with massive attributes as interesting, well then you are in luck. Personally, I am watching movies for the entertainment value, and I was expecting this to be a horror movie, so sitting around watching her strut around in next to no clothing just didn't cut it for me.

And little did it help that the acting performances were dubious at best, and whatever supposed to be dialogue was just abysmal to listen to.

Yeah, this 2017 horror movie from writer and director Richard Stringham was a massive swing and a miss. And I can honestly say that I am never ever going to return to give the movie a second chance. I just honestly don't care one inch about the storyline - or lack thereof, more accurately - nor of the characters in the movie.

I am rating "Close Calls" a generous two out of ten stars, solely for the production value the movie had going for it. Sometimes it is better to just let the phone keep on ringing and go do something else entirely.

"Close Calls" is an entertaining, if a bit long, little horror flick. The film stars Jordan Phipps as Morgan, a teenaged girl who has been grounded after her father caught her in an, ahem, "compromising position" with her boyfriend. Turns out that a year earlier, her mother died and her father is going out on another date with a woman named Brynn that Morgan hates. As he leaves, he reminds her that she needs to give Gramma her pills. Morgan whines and moans and curses and basically acts like a spoiled brat, and her father leaves for his evening. And then Morgan ends up having quite the night, to say the least.

While there is a lot of creepy goodness going on, "Close Calls" almost seems like they intended to make one movie and then changed their minds halfway through and made another one instead, but left all the footage from the first one in there. Not sure if that was intentional or not, but it gives the movie a surrealistic feel about it. In the first half of the film there are hints of the supernatural -- Gramma lives in some weird almost otherworldly part of the house, locked away with all sorts of supernatural hints about her, and Morgan's interactions with her are really unsettling. Also deeply unsettling is what happens during a visit from her boyfriend. Asi f that weren't enough, Morgan also gets some very weird and creepy phone calls. But most of that is seemingly dropped in the second half when the film moves to other events (which I won't spoil) that are not grounded in the supernatural but are, in many ways, even more disturbing.

At two hours and eight minutes, the film could definitely use some trimming. But it never really drags. Jordan Phipps is getting raves in many reviews for her performance in this film, and those raves are well deserved. It is a brave and complex performance. She spends a lot of time in skimpy outfits and is able to balance vulnerability, fear, and determination throughout. The rest of the cast also does well, and the directing and lighting is clean and professional. As is the case with many indie flicks, the sound could use some work (sometimes too soft and dialogue is spoken very quickly so hard to understand), but still pretty decent. Overall, the film packs a nice whallop and its virtues make it easy to overlook its flaws.

Overall, easy to recommend "Close Calls" as an solid way for horror movie fans to spend a couple of hours.

A gorgeously photographed fever dream of a movie that unfortunately has too many ideas floating around and competing for the spotlight to do any of them justice. You have a teenage "bad girl" forced to stay home and care for her ailing grandmother while her father and wicked stepmother-to-be go out to dinner. She gets really high and things start getting progressively weirder as she receives mysterious phone calls and her grandmother turns into a grotesque monster.

Nothing is ever really explained and the grandmother seems to only be there to give the lead a reason to stay home. She doesn't figure into any of the main action at all and is only really good for a few interesting shot moments of surrealism.

There's some obvious talent in front of and behind the camera, but the script isn't as flawless as the visual elements and it can make Close Calls feel a bit like a chore to sit through during certain moments, but when it comes to life, it can be really interesting. At least the filmmakers were going for something different and it's not another boring slasher movie we've seen a trillion times.

Close Calls is one of those films that sort of defies description. Is it a home invasion movie? Sort of. A slasher? It has its slasher-y moments. A piece of an Italian horror inspired fever dream? Definitely! It's a shame that, with so many strong influences, Close Calls never quite gels as a cohesive whole, but we'll get to that later.

Close Calls is about a young woman who's pretty bummed to be left to care for her ailing grandmother who lives in her and her father's attic while her father goes off on a date with her royal witch of a stepmother-to-be. Feeling bored, our heroine takes some drugs and things start getting a bit out of hand. Is she imagining that her grandmother lives on a soiled mattress in a dusty attic? Are those phone calls she keeps getting really pose any major threat?

Writer/director Richard Stringham has a gorgeous visual style, wild ideas, and a flair for finding beauty in the macabre, but his script is messy and suffers from overlength. Honestly, the entire subplot with the grandmother could have been removed altogether since it's never quite clear if the grandmother really does live in a disgusting old attic or if that's just something the heroine is imagining. It's interesting by itself, but it doesn't end up adding much in the end. The evil stepmother has an awful English accent (I'll feel like an idiot if she's actually English, but it sounded phony to my ears and could have been avoided altogether) and some of her moments between her and the father could have been trimmed a bit.

Leading actress, Jordan Phillips, is pretty good, though, and she'd better be since she's in just about every frame of the film. It did seem like a strange and distracting choice to have her in a bra and panties for the entire film, though. I kept wanting her to at least put on some pajamas before she catches cold.

Close Calls is definitely a movie you'll remember even if it's not quite a masterpiece (although, the cinematography is some of the best I've seen in an indie horror film in quite some time).