“Have
you checked the children?” The
most chilling question for parents and babysitters everywhere. In 1979, the
nightmares parents had become a cinematic reality. The famous film When a Stranger Calls created the fear,
which produced a psychopathic killer who stalks
babysitters. Not only is the child being endangered, but even worse, the parent
is not the one around when it is happening.
In the original film, Jill, a
babysitter, is being stalked by the murderer and receives strange calls all
night. When Jill alerts the police they suggest it is just a prank caller, but
when the odd phone calls continue she goes to the police again who then begin a
trace on the phone. When the phone rings again, Jill answers to hear that the
police discovered the calls are coming from inside the house and to get out
immediately. As soon as she can get to the door to escape, a cop is standing on
the other side to come to her rescue. When back up arrives and they search the house
they discover the children to be murdered in their beds and the killer nowhere
to be found. It doesn’t end there though, because seven years later once Jill
has her own children the obscene calls she received as a teenager begin to
happen again. While these calls are being made, the killer has no idea that a
private investigator hired by the murdered children’s parents is also on the
search for him.
In the remake premiering in 2006,
things changed up a bit. The film focuses completely on the one night of Jill
babysitting and doesn’t follow her down the road seven years later. The film is
centered on the high school student Jill who is made to babysit for a wealthy
family as a punishment and is missing a school bonfire that all her friends and
ex boyfriend are attending. Upon arrival to the very sleek mansion, she
discovers the children she is babysitting are already asleep and doesn’t have
to meet or deal with them. Shortly after her arrival she begins receiving
strange phone calls, which she suspects to be her friends having a laugh while
at the bonfire. When she answers the phone, she hears “Have you checked the children?”,
she panics. She runs to check and finds them sleeping in their beds. The next
call freaks her out to the point of her dialing the police because the caller
knows she went upstairs to check the children. As in the original, the police
suspect it to be prank calling but to put her mind at ease say they will trace
it. She gets the same news as the original babysitter; the call is coming from
inside the house. This sends Jill into frenzy, go upstairs save the children?
Save herself? She dashes up the stairs to find them and get them out of the
house but also stay hidden from the killer. The entire night is spent on saving
not only her own life, but two children as well.
The remake differs from the film in
many aspects because it expanded the small beginning scene of the original into
a whole movie, which is an interesting take.
@itsnottrystan
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