The Visitor (1979)
"Stridulum" (original title)

The soul of a young girl with telekinetic powers becomes the prize in a fight between forces of God and the Devil.

Director:

Giulio Paradisi

Writers:

Ovidio G. Assonitis (story), Luciano Comici (screenplay),

Stars:

Mel Ferrer, Glenn Ford, Lance Henriksen

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Mel Ferrer	...	Dr. Walker
Glenn Ford	...	Det. Jake Durham
Lance Henriksen	...	Raymond Armstead
John Huston	...	Jerzy Colsowicz
Joanne Nail	...	Barbara Collins
Sam Peckinpah	...	Dr. Sam Collins
Shelley Winters	...	Jane Phillips
Paige Conner	...	Katy Collins
Ja Townsend
Jack Dorsey
Johnny Popwell
Wallace Wilkinson	...	Police Captain
Steve Somers
Lou Walker
Walter Gordon Sr.

Storyline

The soul of a young girl with telekinetic powers becomes the prize in a fight between forces of God and the Devil.

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Plot Keywords:

occult | terror | demon | alien | violence | 

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Taglines:

They know we are here...

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Genres:

Horror | Sci-Fi

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

USA Italy

Language:

English

Release Date:

1980 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Visitor

Filming Locations:

Dear Studios, Rome, Lazio, Italy

Box Office

Budget:

$800,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Brouwersgracht Investments, Film Ventures International (FVI), Swan American Film

Technical Specs

Runtime:

108 min 108 min (DVD)

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Sam Peckinpah had trouble remembering his lines. Because of Peckinpah's difficulty with his dialogue, the fact that his character was the ex-husband of Barbara Collins was never clearly established in the movie. Moreover, Peckinpah's voice was dubbed by another actor.

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Goofs

After the police officer is attacked by the bird and rolls his car down the bank, we see that the car is clearly about to come to rest upright. But subsequently we see the car upside down as it catches fire.

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Quotes

Detective Jake Durham: Now listen to me Katy isn't there something you want to tell me?
Katy Collins: Yeah. Go fuck yourself!

User Reviews

appealingly weird mish-mosh of aliens, evil businessmen, demonic children, and birds

Weird movie, but it appealed to me. It does have plot elements and maybe even scenes that are derivative of other movies, but it puts them in such a strange blend that it comes out pretty original.

The movie opens with an old man on a barren otherworldly surface. It goes from him to a man with his girlfriend and her daughter at a basketball game. He's the team's owner. The editing and music in the scene are odd. The music throughout the movie tends to be incongruously more energetic and dramatic that the scene itself or its context. The young girl lowers her glasses to look one of the players right in the eye. He manages a dunk in the last second, and the ball evidently explodes in fire or light as he does so.

The old man from the opening (I believe he is The Visitor) shows up in an airport carrying a passport where he is met by a man with a shaved head. He's taken to the roof of a skyscraper where there are lots of people wearing identical outfits all with shaved heads carrying up large gray boxes. Later, there are white screens on the roof, behind which people's shadows move.

The basketball team owner has boardroom meetings with mysterious men who are unhappy with him. He is to get married to his girlfriend and have a son, but he is not having much luck with that.

The little girl has a birthday party. She sees the old man there, but maybe he isn't really there. When she opens a box that should contain a toy peacock that talks in a creepy voice (we saw it being bought earlier), it instead has a handgun. She takes it out happily, and throws it on a table, where it goes off, shooting her mother. Her mother is rehabilitated as much as she can be, which is inter-cut with the girl doing gymnastics routines.

The girl's eyes sometimes seem to have a white light in the irises, and she seems to have power over birds. There is a memorable scene with a policeman (who she swears at like a sailor) on a highway when he encounters a bird.

Many more weird scenes follow! The end leaves things a bit of a mystery, to say the least. If your usual horror fare is a remake or the latest installment in a seemingly endless series, best to avoid this one.