In this Rear Window-esque thriller, John Carpenter hones his horror filmmaking skills with this stalker story made shortly before Halloween.

This screening includes John Carpenter’s short film, “Captain Voyeur” (1969), containing numerous motifs that reappear in Someone’s Watching Me! and Halloween.

A young woman starts a new life in the big city after a nasty breakup. Having developed a strange and morbid sense of humor, she jokes with everyone she meets and swiftly lands a new gig directing live television. She befriends her lesbian co-worker (Adrienne Barbeau), initiates a hopeful romance with a gentlemanly professor she meets at a bar, and contends with a stalker who tracks her every move.

Based on the true story of a horrifying incident in Chicago, Someone’s Watching Me! is the first of three films John Carpenter directed in 1978 (followed by Halloween and 3-hour television biopic Elvis). Keep an eye out for the dolly zoom (aka Hitchcock shot and Jaws effect) Carpenter borrows for a pivotal scene.