Couch Potato Pickings - When a Stranger Calls | Movie Talk | What's on TV

On Five US tonight at 9pm

Anyone who’s ever received an unwanted phone-call from a stranger (and I’m not talking about double glazing sales) will know how unsettling it can be. Even if you’re sure that the caller has dialed your number randomly and will have no access to information about who you are or where you live, it’s sometimes tricky to rise above irrational fears that he might be lurking outside watching you.

It’s probably because the crank caller has the ability to invade the sanctuary of the home that the experience feels so intrusive and disarming and it's not surprising that it’s become fodder for urban legends.

As this delightfully detailed Halloween web site states, “Urban legends thrive on people's deepest fears -- that our safe world can crack at any moment and a madman will change our lives forever. That alone is enough to give anyone some second thoughts about our everyday routine.”

In tonight’s movie, a remake of the 1979 horror chiller, a teenager (Camilla Belle) is terrorised by a series of anonymous phone calls while babysitting for a wealthy family in the Colorado mountains.

It’s based on the classic urban legend of the babysitter. Read about it here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IY06922dL2s&fs=1