The Face of Fear

Based on an early Dean Koontz novel, adapted for the small screen by Koontz & Alan Jay Glueckman, this fun, formulaic thriller exceeded expectations. Fearfully trapped within a deserted skyscraper over a holiday weekend, telegenic married couple, Connie Weaver (Pam Dawber) and Graham Harris (Lee Horsley) are relentlessly stalked by buff, self-aggrandising, luxuriously coiffed maniac Bollinger (Kevin Conroy). Competently performed by amiable telly titans, Pam Dawber and effortlessly hunky Lee Horsley, Farhad Mann's slick serial killer TV frequently delivers the escapist goods. While the familiar plot is the purest piffle, the film's stronger points are the likeable protagonists, with some fine supporting work from Bob Balaban, William Sadler, and a neat-o nemesis in the sinisterly smug, baritone-voiced guise of Nietzschean nutball, Frank Dwight Bollinger. No masterpiece, but a worthy time-killer for thriller fans. No explicit language, zero T&A, The Face of Fear's exploitative elements are batso Bollinger's surprisingly intense kills.