The Call
2013 · Directed by Brad Anderson
Original language: English
- crime
- thriller
The story
Jordan Turner is an experienced 911 operator but when she makes an error in judgment and a call ends badly, Jordan is rattled and unsure if she can continue. But when teenager Casey Welson is abducted in the back of a man's car and calls 911, Jordan is the one called upon to use all of her experience, insights and quick thinking to help Casey escape, and not just to save her, but to make sure the man is brought to justice.
What it’s like
Cold fluorescent light and muted blue-grey tones fill the first act, with the camera held tight on a headset-wearing dispatcher as voices come through a phone line, so much of the dread lives in what you hear rather than see. Sound does the heavy lifting: ringing lines, clipped calls, a quiet room thick with tension. When the story moves out into the open, it turns to washed-out highways, dusty gas-station forecourts, and a dim, claustrophobic house where shadows press close. The score is sparse and synthetic, pulsing under long stretches of silence. Pacing is taut and relentless, a suspense thriller built on a ticking clock and a voice on the line, with an arc about a professional regaining her nerve under pressure. Intensity is high: abduction, sustained fear for a teenage girl, predatory menace, and violence against captives including murder, with gore kept fairly limited and the dread doing most of the work. Best for viewers who want a grimly paced, tense thriller with a capable heroine, not something gentle, and who can handle kidnapping and violence against young women.
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