Heart of Stone Reviews

Attention thrill-kill fans: Dale Trevillion's thrill-kill picture offers two serial slayers for the price of one. Unfortunately, that's the only bargain this wallow in perversity offers. Los Angeles mom Mary Sanders (Angie Everhart) worries about sending her naive daughter, April (Tracy Ovist), off to college because a wily coed killer has been terrorizing nearby campuses. Her husband, Ken (Peter J. Lucas), is too busy to share her concerns; a preoccupied university professor, he's always commuting to out-of-town field trips. In the throes of empty-nest syndrome, Mary has a one-night stand with gigolo/blackmailer Steve Sterns (James Wilder), who becomes her stalker; Steve even ravishes her in her own shower while the clueless Ken waits downstairs. The implicit threat of violence suddenly begins to seem very real when someone murders Steve's last middle-aged conquest, Mary’s close friend and confidante Sheila (Jean Carol), in a motel. The police naturally take a long look at Mary and Steve, who tricks Mary into providing him with an alibi by playing on her fear of disclosure. Distraught, Mary begs her brother-in-law, Frank (John Duerler), to frighten Steve into leaving her alone; when Frank tries, Steve kills him. Afraid that Steve is the sorority slayer, Mary confesses her infidelity to the self-righteous Ken and tells the police that she was lying when she gave Steve an alibi. Steve responds by convincing them that Mary is a delusional woman, furious because she's been dumped, and kidnaps April for good measure. Is Steve the only killer at large, or is there someone even nuttier out there? Apparently determined to prove that she's more than a former model, Everhart pitches her performance so high that she crosses the line into trying to hard. She's not alone — everyone seems to be doing the same except for screenwriter Emilio Ferrari, whose screenplay makes an incoherent hash of its dual-psychopath conceit.