Murder By Phone (1982)

Episode 445, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast

Todd: Hello, and welcome to another episode of Two Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.

Craig: And I’m Craig.

Todd: Well, today we are doing a film that I chose. This is mainly a tribute to Richard Chamberlain, long time American actor slash heartthrob slash singer, who really made his. Name in the sixties on a television show called Dr. Kilder. Mm-hmm. It’s like a medical drama. He was just the handsome, dashing Dr.

Kilder, who saved lives and solved problems. And then, you know, went on to be in a lot of television, a lot of movies. I remember him most. From this film that my dad take took me to see in the movie theater in 1985 called King Solomon’s Mines. Did you ever see that that was a Canon movie that was meant to be sort of an Indiana Jones knockoff, or just trying, they were trying to start.

A franchise and they did two of them and they didn’t do very well. He later talked about how he thought he was kind of tricked into doing it because the budget was so lousy and there were a lot of famous people involved, but they, some of them were phoning it in. Some of them, the director was clearly just kind barely even there, and so it was a very disappointing experience for him.

The movie got terrible reviews, but when I was a kid, I remembered it being kind of a cool movie. And then as an adult, I went back to see it and I was like, yeah, I can see this is very, very dated, but this film we’re doing, I saw when I was a kid on tv. Now I dunno about you, but I have these movies that I caught when I was a kid and then forever for the rest of my life, I’m remembering it and wondering what movie was that for us?

One of those movies we did was Burnt Offerings. Because, yeah. 

Craig: Yeah. Both of us also had that about The Red Room or whatever. Yes. After School Special was that we talked about. 

Todd: We finally managed to track it down and actually watch it after all those years. This was one of those movies when I first caught this movie on television and I probably came in in the middle of it.

I was so entranced and freaked out by it. The movie is called Murder by Phone from 1982. 82. And I, I was terrified by this idea that there’s this guy who could, with just the push of a button, zap people through their phone and kill them. And I think that the, the kill scenes also kind of shocked me at the time as well.

So this is a movie that I had this gone back to look for. And you would think that murder by phone would be the easiest. Thing to find. I was looking up dial M for murder and murder this, and phone this and that. And I never, until about a couple years ago, found this film Murder by phone. And then, uh, when he died, I instantly was like, Craig, if we’re gonna do a tribute to this guy, I really want to do this movie.

It’s, it really is one of the few horror movies that he was in. And, uh, it just left such a deep impression on me, and it turned out to be kind of hard to find. I found it on YouTube. Yeah, it’s on YouTube, but it’s not a very good copy. No, it’s not. It’s ripped straight from the VHS. This has never gotten a proper like DVD Remastering or anything like that, but we were able to find it and I don’t know, had you ever seen or heard of this before?

No. 

Craig: No, I never heard of it. At all. Richard Chamberlain, I don’t really know a whole lot about him. Frankly. The thing that I know him from is he did a one episode guest appearance on Will and Grace, and I think that he was kind of making fun of himself, but he, he didn’t appear as himself, but he was.

Elderly, and, and that’s what he played. Like he played this, this really, really elderly gay guy that the other men on the show felt, we need to look out for him. You know, like these elder gays, you know, they paved the way, you know, we’ve, we’ve gotta, we’ve gotta take care of them now. But, but he was just very annoying and clingy and I think, I think as it turned out, he was.

Really not a good person. Like I don’t remember if he was racist or like something there see was something, and so eventually they were like, no, fuck you. But it was cute to see him play an elder gay ’cause he was right. He, he was a gay guy. But you know, of course in Hollywood, in his heyday, that’s just something that.

You didn’t talk about it. You know, leading men had to work to keep that quiet if they wanted to maintain their careers. And he did for a long time. He didn’t come out, I think he came out in like 2003 or something like that. Yeah. He wrote, he 

Todd: also wrote a book about his personal life, I think as a gay man.

Craig: Yeah. Yeah. And I, and, and I think that he was in a long-term, committed relationship with another man. And so, and, and like, but like you said. He was this big heartthrob and I went back and for purposes of research Okay. Looked at, looked at, looked at some old, like shirtless pictures of him. And, uh, he was a good looking guy.

He really was a good looking guy. Yeah. The, he’s, you know, I, I don’t have any idea how old he is in this movie. He’s like in his 

Todd: forties. He’s pretty, but pretty close to our age now. 

Craig: Yeah. Yeah. He, and he, he still looks great. I mean, I, God, I wish I was in the shape that he was in at that time. I wish now I was in that shape and I’m certainly not.

He looks good. I don’t know. It, it, he’s in a period I think in his life where he’s got like a big bushy beard and, yeah. I don’t, I don’t, I don’t personally find it app