Blind Date

Blind Date tells the story of Jonathon Radcliffe, who on recovering from an accident that left him without sight, finds himself an integral part in the mystery of a series of grisly murders in Athens.

Nico Mastorakis is one of the best cult film makers of the eighties, and its for movies like this that show why.

A brilliantly subtle Hitchcokian idea, but better, it is full of interesting scenes, if not suspenseful moments. The acting is good but is brought down by the performances of the killer's targets.

Not for everyone, but a real overlooked classic.

I only want to know what happened to the proposed sequel promised at the end, that says Jonathon Radcliffe will return in 'Run, Stumble and Fall.'

This is an excellent film. The thing that struck me first was that this was a serial killer flick in which the police hardly figure at all, you see them once or twice from a distance. You have two stories running in parallel until finally, and inevitably, they cross.

The second thing that really got me thinking is that our agent of justice probably got the wrong man. The evidence we have is far too circumstantial and would have been thrown out by any right minded jury, if the judge had not already dismissed the case.

Was the real killer driving the cab from which Kirstie Alley's character fled?

The character of Jonathan Ratcliff is interesting because, whatever his virtues might be, he is also a stalker. And we discover that when he is blinded there is no physical reason for his disability. On some subconscious level he has chosen not to see, and when he is given a device which enables him to see, after a fashion, it is in black and white and works on the same principle as sonar, that is it reflects back the signals he sends. He no longer sees the whole picture, and neither do we.



The concept of blind Justice is on one level a reassuring one since everyone is equal irrespective of race, creed, power etc.. However, on the other hand, Justice is blind! This could mean that it cannot differentiate between the innocent and the guilty.

In the film the character of Jonathan Ratcliff is living out a fantasy, when at the end he is asked by the woman he has just 'rescued' what his name is he replies, 'A friend': like a guardian angel or a comic book superhero. He is a voyeur who has been forced to take a role, to follow a destiny and he shapes that destiny himself.

The film itself is well put together and there are some wonderful Hitchcockian touches, especially in the way it exploits the blindness of the central character and the limitations and possibilities of the electronic device that substitute for his eyes.

I rate this film 8 out of 10, very thought provoking.

Don't we all have someone in our circle of friends of whom we say: "Don't pay too much attention to X, that's just how he is. He is a bit weird and insane in the brain, but we like him". Well, that's also the best way to describe what kind of writer/director Niko Mastorakis is. His films are pleasantly deranged cocktails of far-fetched plots, sleazy perversions, extreme violence, and unconventional humor. But hey, it's Mastorakis... He's harmless and he means well...

"Blind Date" is almost impossible to describe. It's about playboy/businessman Jonathan Ratcliff who is actually a stalker and voyeur, but he's still portrayed as the hero. He goes blind from running against a tree, but his fancy doctor tells him it's actually due to an unprocessed trauma. He wants to use Jonathan as a guinea pig to plant a kind of computer chip in his skull that will replace his eyes and be directly connected to the brain. Now, Jonathan has the vision of a Commodore-64 computer, and his brain goes bonkers when he plugs his head into a video game. Meanwhile, in Athens - yes, we are in Greece - there is a serial killer wandering around who slices open young women, but only after they have undressed. Although a dozen women have already gotten into an old taxi before they were found dead, there is apparently no police looking for the killer. Don't worry, because Jonathan is connected to the killer (and I really have no idea how that's possible) and he goes after him with his black and white vision and a terribly ugly car!

As I said, there is nothing of structure or logic in "Blind Date". BUT, there are a lot of topless actresses (including Kirstie Alley... for lovers of "before they were famous" lists), gruesome massacres, and an arsenal of corny crooner songs! With a little imagination you could also call "Blind Date" a Greek variant of the Italian giallo. Proceed at your own risk.

Joseph Bottoms plays American Jonathan Ratcliff, living & working in Athens. His world is turned upside down when he suddenly losses his sight, but thankfully for him an electronic sonar device has just been invented which allows blind users to "see" (via very dated looking computer graphics) & he agrees to become the first person to try it. Meanwhile an unknown, gloved killer is murdering beautiful young women with a scalpel & it's only a matter of time before their paths cross. I'd never heard of this movie before, picked it up cheap on DVD from a charity shop, but once the name Nico Mastorakis appeared as director/producer on the opening credits my interest suddenly perked up (he made the infamous, one time "video nasty" Island of Death). I found this is to be reasonable attempt at making a giallo style psycho thriller. There's some good camera work going on during some of the more suspenseful sequences. Plenty of female topless nudity, including Kirstie Alley doing apparently her only ever topless on camera scene, though that's hardly a recommendation! Pretty tame in the gore department, only two onscreen kills, both bloody but brief. As already mentioned the computer graphics look very dated - even for 1984 - but it only adds to it's charm.

This is an interesting horror/thriller movie about a man who goes blind who gets fitted with a sci-fi device by doctors which ends up allowing him to see strange things. The movie is not very good frankly but it is a good and original premise and not bad for a cruddy 1980s sci-fi thriller/horror movie. Lots of known actors in it too back when they were younger.