I wanted to but couldn't!

It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

I wasn't much of a Clint Eastwood fan over the years but now am appreciating him more as he has mellowed with age. I found a DVD set of seven of his early movies at my public library and "Play Misty" is one of them.The very beginning has a long aerial shot of the California coastline and towards the end of that shot lingers on one home on the bluffs above the Pacific Ocean. That location is key to the story and especially to the end of the story.Clint Eastwood is disk jockey Dave with a local radio program. Seems just about every day he gets a call with a particular request, "play Misty for me." One day after work he is at his favorite bar and encounters an attractive woman. She is Jessica Walter as Evelyn, we soon find out she is the one who calls with the request. Being a suitably horny single man he takes the bait and they end up in bed together. She seems very nice but when she starts to show up unannounced at his place, with groceries, and asking how he likes his steak cooked, it becomes clear that she is an obsessed fan. Dave finds this annoying at first, then downright dangerous. Then things are complicated by his old girlfriend coming back to town. All in all a worthwhile Clint Eastwood movie.SPOILERS: The ending. As Evelyn's intrusions get more and more worrisome Dave finds that she has gone to the girlfriend's house and tied her up. Dave arrives and in struggling with Evelyn throws a single punch, the only one in the whole movie, she falls through the back plate glass window, over the back porch railing, and down the cliff to her death.

"Play Misty for Me" isn't my favorite Eastwood movie, but it's interesting to watch this is a directorial debut. It's largely muted, nothing flashy, but also not inexperienced. The guy had influences and he surely drew on them for his first time out. And his coastal getaway hamlet of Carmel is almost a supporting character. But Jessica Walter owns this thing and that's clear when the film frags in her absence. Up until that ending, it's hard to watch this and not compare it to "Fatal Attraction" (maybe a tad unfavorably), but Eastwood really kicks things up for the big finish; frenzied cutting, heightened stakes, those damn scissors). It's a slow-burn, certainly, but worth it for that final payoff.6/10

Jessica Walter (whom I always thought was striking) stalks late-night radio host, Clint Eastwood, in his directorial debut. He has that charisma that would appeal to the lonely, forgotten. I have known some jocks and they need to be careful of fans who become too familiar. Jessica is nuts. She is truly psychotic. The strength of this movie is the escalation of her utterly malignant obsession with Eastwood. Of course, he has loved ones and friends; he has a successful career where he must please his bosses. She inveigles herself into every part of his life. If she can't have him, she will destroy him. She is ruining his life. We can only root for this man to rid himself of her, but, of course, easier said than done.

"Play Misty for Me" could have been a good thriller but is let down by the script, acting and direction.Firstly, the script. Evelyn looms out of nowhere with no back story. Does she have a job or home? Was she always a psycho? What draws her to Dave? With none of these questions answered, she is more like a slasher film monster with supernatural abilities e.g. following Dave as if he had a GPS tracker on him, convincing Tobie to be her flat mate, killing a police detective with a pair of scissors, etc.Secondly, the acting. Jessica Walter is good. Clint is OK but squints all the time as if he is facing down Lee Van Cleef in a Spaghetti Western. The rest of the cast range from boring (Donna Mills as Tobie) to over-the-top (James McEachin as Al).Finally, the direction. Clint Eastwood had to start somewhere I suppose but this is self-indulgent and badly paced. Clint likes Carmel so we get panoramas of sea cliffs and pine forests. Clint likes jazz so we get home movies of the Monterey Jazz Festival. Clint likes sex so he gets naked in a waterfall.I seem to be one of the few people who has not seen "Fatal Attraction" so I will not compare the two films. But I have seen movies with suspense and "Play Misty for Me" has very little of that.