Don't Hang Up

In Director S.F. Brownrigg's DON'T HANG UP, Amanda Post (Susan Bracken) returns to her ailing grandmother's house, 13 years after her mother was murdered there. Amanda finds her grandmother near death, and a group of unsavory townsfolk seemingly up to no good.

It's not long before she starts receiving some disturbing phone calls, while someone lurks about the place, watching her through cracks and holes in the walls. Murder abounds as the killer's identity and motives are slowly revealed.

While not the best horror movie ever made, it's enjoyable enough, and has an unusual / unexpected twist at the end. It's also fun to watch for actors from other Brownrigg movies, such as DON'T LOOK IN THE BASEMENT...

A young blonde woman named Amanda goes to look after her aging grandmother in her home but finds herself being menaced by a obscene caller,who enjoys collecting dolls and talking to his mannequins."Don't Open the Door!" is a low-budget horror movie made in Texas by S.F Brownrigg.The scene of psycho talking to his mannequin predates the behavior of Joe Spinell's character Frank Zito in "Maniac".The action is slow and there are some dull spots,but the film certainly delivers suspenseful atmosphere.Most of the creep factor comes from Larry O'Dwyer as the breathy,giggling and sleazy psycho in the walls.The characters are bizarre and utterly dysfunctional,the direction is competent and there is a bit of unsettling violence.I loved "Keep My Grave Open" and enjoyed "Don't Open the Door!" as well.8 out of 10.

A young woman reluctantly returns to her home town to oversee her dying grandmother's final days. While staying in the house where she witnessed her mumsy's murder thirteen years earlier, she finds more than a few secrets from her past have come back to haunt her. I appreciate that this movie has such strange execution. It's structure is very different from the typical low-budget horrors of this era, completely eschewing things like mystery (the killer's identity is obvious from the get-go) and resolution. Plot-wise, it borrows from proto-slashers BLACK Christmas and SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT. While it's lesser than both of those films in terms of quality, I did find it undeniably charming, entertaining, and even creepy at times. While the acting in the movie is generally amateur, Susan Bracken is a hoot as the spunky lead who gets to spout some amusing dialogue. She quickly flips the switch from headstrong heroine to full-on basket case and there's not a moment she's on screen where my eyes weren't on her face. It's one of the most memorable horror performances I've watched lately. The movie's biggest downfall is the irritating soap opera-ish theme song in the opening credits that pops up way too often throughout the movie. The freaky dolls in the opening sequence (who also pop up at other points in the movie) sort of make up for it. DON'T OPEN THE DOOR doesn't make much sense and it isn't going to be for everyone, but I found it to be a bizarre and unique viewing experience.

Not quite as good a low budget effort as Mr Brownrigg's earlier, 'Don't look In The Basement' but still well worth catching. This starts rather slow and predictably but soon develops into a real creepy affair with an excellent central performance from Susan Bracken as she spends the entire movie fending off the crazies. Whilst she may not be surrounded by folks quite as crazy as in the earlier film none of them are the sort you would wish to get too close to and as the film progresses a most unpleasant tone begins to permeate the picture. Bracken does plenty of wide eyed screaming, particularly as she really begins to lose it towards the end and with her red outfit and the dark shadows and is certainly a sight to be seen.

Don't Open The Door comes from S.F. Brownrigg who made the equally bizarre Don't Look in the Basement which has become a drive-in/grindhouse/cheapie VHS and DVD staple for years. While this film doesn't have exactly the same kind of manic, low budget energy that film has, it has enough charms of its own to make it worth a watch.

Don't Open the Door follows a young woman who returns home to the house where her mother was murdered and begins receiving strange, obscene phone calls from a psycho who wants her dead.

The acting, much like Basement, is enthusiastic but amateur hour. No one is really awful, but no one is exactly brilliant either. You get the feeling that you're watching the area's most competent community theatre actors having a good time. The concept is solid, but the suspense and scares seem to be put on the backburner until towards the end of the film, which gives us a lot of time to watch the leading lady take a bath or go exploring the house, which isn't terribly exciting.

Where Don't Open the Door excels is with the creepy phone calls and the mood. The phone calls are perhaps some of the genre's creepiest and most unsettling. It also manages to produce a fairly haunting ending.

With a little more effort put into the script, pacing, and scares, this one could have been a contender, but as is, it's an interesting regional time capsule. It's worth seeing once.