Movie Review: The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane

Jodie Foster is celebrating her birthday alone. Her neighbor Frank Hallett (Martin Sheen) shows up and is incredibly creepy. As attractive as Mr. Sheen was and still is, Rynn Jacobs is 13 and is far too young to be receiving suitors. This isn't the Tudor Age!

Rynn goes to the bank and withdraws money from the joint account she has with her father. Cora Hallett, the woman who Mr. Lester leased the house from, surprises Rynn and starts rearranging the furniture. She's extremely irritating and turns out to be the Frank's mother. She's very off-putting and tells Rynn she'll be talking to the school board about the fact that Rynn isn't going to school. A nice police officer named Ron asks if Rynn is okay after he sees Frank talking to her. He takes her home and doesn't press her for where her father is.

Mrs. Hallett comes to visit and goes on her usual mocking, self-appreciation rantings. When Rynn brings up her son, Mrs. Hallett smacks her and goes to the cellar to get the lids for some jelly jars Rynn was giving her. She screams and comes running up the stairs, only to hit herself with the door. She's dead. Oh, well.

While Rynn is trying to start Mrs. Hallett's car, a boy dressed in a cape and a top hat rides up on a bike. He knows who the bike belongs to. Mario, the magician boy, comes back after his magic show at a rich kid's house to have dinner with Rynn. During a magic trick, Mario finds Mrs. Hallett's umbrella. Rynn wrestles it away from him as Police Man Ron shows up to check on Rynn. Mario and Ron have an adorable rapport. When Ron leaves, Frank shows up. Creepy as usual. He makes Rynn admits she loves Gordon, her hamster and only companion. He puts his cigarette against Gordon's head and when the hamster bites him, he throws him into the fireplace. Frank wants Rynn to throw Mario out. Mario grabs his cane out of Frank's hand, unsheathing a rapier and pressing it to Frank's throat.

Rynn entrusts Mario with her secrets: her father's body in the cellar, Mrs. Hallett's body, and how she lives completely alone. They throw Mrs. Hallett's keys into the sea and bury the bodies between the house and some evergreen trees. Um... Rynn gives Mario a sponge bath. Um.... why? She lays on the couch with him and asks him how many times he'd done "it".

When Police Man Ron shows up for his weekly check-in, he's suspicious of her and her father. Mario dresses up as an old man and passes as her father.

Mario is in the hospital with pneumonia and nearly died. Rynn goes to see him and tells him she loves him. When she gets back to the house, she goes straight to bed, turning the lights off. Frank is hiding in the cellar. He now is slightly holding her hostage. He's not upset about his mother's disappearance, only wants Rynn. They sit for tea by the fire and he wants to switch cups with her. As a test (he doesn't want to be poisoned). She switches cups willingly and like the child genius she is, has poisoned her own cup. Frank dies in the same way Rynn's mother had.

Moral of this movie: Hamster-killers never win.