Critic Rating
(read reviews)User Rating
Director
Joseph Ruben
Cast
Terry O'Quinn,
Jill Schoelen,
Shelley Hack,
Charles Lanyer,
Stephen Shellen,
Stephen E. Miller
Genre
Horror,
Thriller
A seemingly mild mannered man—who has just murdered his entire family—quickly adopts a new identity and leaves town. After building a new relationship with a widow and her teenage daughter, he struggles to hide his true identity and maintain a grip on reality.
Chicago Tribune by Dave Kehr
The Stepfather is a nearly perfect work of popular entertainment. A thriller about a psychopathic killer, it is absolutely terrifying. At the same time it is a highly personal work, the expression of a gifted individual. [27 Feb 1987, p.A]
Washington Post by Hal Hinson
It's a terrific, disquietingly entertaining little film -- a piece of genuine Gothic Americana.
Los Angeles Times by Patrick Goldstein
It's an icy parody of suburban bliss, featuring the kind of proud pop who gets his kicks from loving his family to death. [23 Jan 1987, p.15]
The New Yorker by Pauline Kael
A first-rate, cunning, shapely thriller, directed by Joseph Ruben (Dreamscape), from a nifty screenplay by the crime novelist Donald E. Westlake.
TV Guide Magazine
Fueled by an intense and intricate performance by O'Quinn, the movie is a fascinating examination of America's predilection for appearances over substance.
The A.V. Club by Scott Tobias
Appreciating what’s special about The Stepfather involves accepting—or at least tolerating—some clunky moments.
ReelViews by James Berardinelli
The Stepfather doesn’t hold up quite as well as it did during the late 1980s (some of the film’s technical aspects are dated) but it still generates tension and suspense and O’Quinn’s performance has lost none of its power.
Chicago Reader by Pat Graham
This 1987 film doesn't quite leave its slasher antecedents behind, but the styling is never less than assured, and Ruben knows how to put bland, unruffled surfaces to sinister Hitchcockian uses.
TV Guide Magazine by Staff (Not Credited)
Fueled by an intense and intricate performance by O'Quinn, the movie is a fascinating examination of America's predilection for appearances over substance.
Miami Herald by Bill Cosford
It's genuinely terrifying, as scary as it is unexpected. [22 May 1987, p.D5]
Variety
The Stepfather is an engrossing suspense thriller that refreshingly doesn't cheat the audience in terms of valid clues and plot twists.
Variety by Staff (Not Credited)
The Stepfather is an engrossing suspense thriller that refreshingly doesn't cheat the audience in terms of valid clues and plot twists.
Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert
The Stepfather has one wonderful element: Terry O'Quinn's performance.
Time Out
While O'Quinn is effectively scary, one is left longing for Hitchcock's dark, daring wit and disturbingly amoral insights.
The New York Times by Janet Maslin
The Stepfather is too often disappointingly thin.
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