House on Greenapple Road

I saw this once when I was a kid (around 8)...all I remember is the opening scene, it scared the @#$% out of me!...a house, someone coming home, and blood everywhere...very chilling. Plus, I lived on Greenville Road so the fear "hit home" even more.

That 70's made-for-TV-movies genre is greatly under-appreciated and unrecognized. Other movies that I remember about the same time that were really creepy (you might too):

• "When Michael Calls" (Ben Gazzara, Elizabeth Ashley, Micheal Douglas)

• "The Screaming Woman" (Olivia DeHavilland)

• "Picture Mommy Dead" (Zsa Zsa Gabor)

• "How Awful About Allen" (Anthony Perkins)

• "Two On a Guillotine" (Connie Stevens)

• "The Victim" (Elizabeth Montgomery)

This movie haunted me for years. I was 8 or 9 years old when I first saw it and it scared the hell out of me. Back then I was past the point of being afraid of "monsters" and such, but the opening scene in which a really young Eve Plumb( yes, "Jan" on The Brady Bunch) comes home from school, enters the empty house calling out for her mother and finds a bloody hand-print on the refrigerator just hit home with me. What would be a child's worst fear?? Losing their parent(s). The rest of the film is a decent enough murder mystery with some fairly big name 70s actors rounding out the cast. Watch for it in reruns on local TV; I have seen it a couple times over the years.

I'm glad to see all of the positive comments for this unjustly neglected - and, apparently, largely unknown - made-for-TV movie. Can't imagine why it's not available on home video (or at least on the Mystery Channel or some such).

This whodunnit is presented with style and economy; a lean, mean little thriller, with a prestigious cast that just won't quit. In case you didn't peruse the names, I'll spotlight a few: Janet Leigh, Julie Harris, Walter Pigeon, Keenan Wynn, Barry Sullivan, William Windom, Ed Asner and, of course, Chris George, a solid and dependable actor with screen presence and authority, who was taken from us too soon. Not many made-for-TV movies that weren't big-deal miniseries had casts like this (if any).

Along with these are some players whose names may not be as well-known, but whose talent is as illustrious as those named above, and whose faces will be quite familiar to anyone who was a TV viewer during the late 60's-early 70's. Tim O'Connor, Paul Fix and Joanne Linville deserve honorable mention.

This production is intelligent, witty and literate; indeed, some elements of the plot, dialogue and visuals were pretty strong for TV of the day. At any rate, it's far superior to so many of the tired retreads that pass for mystery-thrillers today (unless you watch the BBC a lot.)

All in all, a nifty picture that deserves to be seen

I really enjoyed this movie and I wish it was released to video. In the opening scene, where Janet Leigh's daughter Eve Plumb comes in, raises chills. There's blood on the refrigerator door. You wonder, what happened. Where there's blood then there must be a body. Could it be Janet Leigh was murdered like in Psycho, by Anthony Perkins? You start detective work, investigating and come up, with your own clues.

It's good to know that I'm not the only one who was freaked out by those chilling opening scenes! I too was a very young child when I saw this film, so I can scarcely recall any details...only that infamous kitchen footage. The title alone still gives me the creeps! It is definitely a shame that this movie is not shown on TV, and is apparently not available on VHS or DVD. I'd really love to watch it again to see if it holds up to my childhood memories! Sadly, I have a feeling it can't possibly be as frightening as I remember. Years of slasher film viewing have left me quite jaded. Perhaps I'll just read the book instead.