Small scale but well done horror flick that inspired two sequels and a remake. I desired to watch it mostly because it starred Terry O'Quinn of Lost fame. He plays the titular stepfather, a psycho who desperately longs for the perfect, 1950s TV-inspired family. He hooks up with established families as the mother's new husband, but turns violent as soon as the family hints at imperfection. The film starts off with him leaving his latest murder victims, and picks up with him just having married a widow (Shelly Hack) with a teenage daughter (Jill Schoelen). Schoelen hasn't taken the death of her father well, nor her mother's marriage to this new guy so soon afterward. She begins acting out at school, which irks O'Quinn toward murderousness. After she witnesses a secret tirade, and after seeing an article in the newspaper about the previous murders, she begins to investigate her new stepfather. The main reason to see this is for O'Quinn. His nutjob is almost at a Norman Bates-level of quality. A lot of the rest of the film is majorly flawed. Schoelen is cute and not a bad actress, but she can't pull off bad girl at all. And it never makes sense that the police never caught this guy.
Review of The Stepfather
