Fright is a 1971 British thriller film starring Susan George, Ian Bannen, Honor Blackman, and John Gregson.

[3] It is said by many horror fans and commentators to be one of or even the first film in which an isolated babysitter is stalked by an unrelenting and psychopathic antagonist, rendering it the forerunner of dozens of movies to use similar premises over the following decades.

[4] College student Amanda is babysitting for Helen and Jim, watching after their young son at their large estate in the woods.

Chris tells Amanda that Helen and Jim aren't married and that her actual husband was put in a psychiatric institution after trying to kill her.

At the front door, Amanda finds Chris, covered in blood; with him is Brian, who claims to be a neighbor who heard a commotion outside.

Amanda flees out the front door just as police arrive at the home, but she is pulled back inside by Brian, who threatens her and Tara with a shard of glass.

Helen enters the home, where Brian locks her inside, and begins choking her after he finds she has brought in a canister of tear gas.

Fantale Filmes was a company composed of producers Harry Fine and Michael Styles and writer Tudor Gates.

[5] Variety said "Good production values, some excellent shocks and well developed tension cannot lift" the film "above program status"... "Tudor Gates’ script has bad moments and makes the police act as if in slapstick comedy and not a serious thriller.

Ian Wilson’s camerawork effectively contrasts the warm, cheery atmosphere of the restaurant where the mother dines, with the cold, foreboding house where terror reigns.

"[12] New York Times called it "describably dreadful... Collinson, who has made some bad movies in his short career ("The Penthouse" and "The Italian Job," among others), bottoms himself with the dreary affectations in "Fright".

"[13] A review published in The Village Voice noted: "Fright has little else on its mind other than what the title implies, but the first half hour of the film is so full of red herrings and squeaky doors that all the potential for situational horror is soon dissipated.

[16] Robert Sellers of the Radio Times called the film "formulaic" in direction and added: "George merely alternates between pouting and screaming," assessing her performance as a "dress rehearsal for her ordeal in Straw Dogs.

"[17] Vincent Canby of The New York Times criticized the film's cinematography and "arbitrary cruelties," deeming it a "a describably dreadful English suspense melodrama.