Former Charlie Girl and Charlie's Angel Shelley Hack receives top billing in this low-budget bore though the cover art proclaims it "a classic tale of Gothic suspense". Actually, Shelley's big episode "Of Ghosts and Angels" deserves that title more than this snoozer.
Hack plays a blind switchboard operator at a remote Maine Inn, being shut down after being sold. Somehow this coincides with the robbery of an armored truck taking place nearby involving three criminals (two men, one woman) who eventually shoot the guards and seek retreat in the abandoned Inn.
The rest of the movie has Shelley, looking as far from the Tiffany Welles fashion-plate character as possible in a baggy sweater, ankle socks and plain canvas sneakers, trying to outsmart the bad guys by throwing the breaker and trying to hide from them (on her own terms, see?) a la Audrey Hepburn in "Wait Until Dark".
The bad guys have more lines than Shelley. The only reason they become aware of her presence is because the pizza that arrives from an androgynous delivery boy in denim short-shorts only has anchovies on HALF of it. So there must be someone else at the Inn besides the tight-lipped old handyman they strangled to death earlier.
I admit I didn't see the twist at the end coming, so there was a bit of a payoff, and the way Shelley disposes of the bad girl is inspired, but rent before you buy. For completists who want to see everything the Angels have ever done. Even when found in a bargain bin, this one's NOT a keeper.
Hack plays a blind switchboard operator at a remote Maine Inn, being shut down after being sold. Somehow this coincides with the robbery of an armored truck taking place nearby involving three criminals (two men, one woman) who eventually shoot the guards and seek retreat in the abandoned Inn.
The rest of the movie has Shelley, looking as far from the Tiffany Welles fashion-plate character as possible in a baggy sweater, ankle socks and plain canvas sneakers, trying to outsmart the bad guys by throwing the breaker and trying to hide from them (on her own terms, see?) a la Audrey Hepburn in "Wait Until Dark".
The bad guys have more lines than Shelley. The only reason they become aware of her presence is because the pizza that arrives from an androgynous delivery boy in denim short-shorts only has anchovies on HALF of it. So there must be someone else at the Inn besides the tight-lipped old handyman they strangled to death earlier.
I admit I didn't see the twist at the end coming, so there was a bit of a payoff, and the way Shelley disposes of the bad girl is inspired, but rent before you buy. For completists who want to see everything the Angels have ever done. Even when found in a bargain bin, this one's NOT a keeper.