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Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

The film has way too many conveniences with the killer always being at the right place at the right time. I found this for the sake of the story only, and not convincing or effective. It probably was very suspenseful at the time, but not by today's standards, and unfortunately it did not stood the test of time. I understand the killer is psychotic and a sick individual, but even so too much does not make sense for this to be believable, scary or exciting.

Saw this in the mid 80s on a VHS. Revisited it recently on a DVD. Found the second viewing very boring n mild, especially in todays time. Lee Grant enrages misogynist serial killer Michael Ironside because of her strong views on women's rights. After narrowly escaping death, Lee finds herself stalked in her hospital by the killer. None of the performances are that well done n Michael Ironside has very little dialogue and just has to look insane, something he's fantastic at. Only two interesting aspects r ther in this boring n tame film. 1st, there's no attempt to hide who the killer is. Right from the start, we know the murderer's identity. 2nd, there is jus one tense scene in which Lee returns home to find Ironside bursting out wearing nothing but some of her jewellery and slashing at her. Afterwards the film became repetitive and slow and it was lacking enough bloodshed. The film lacked tension n suspense. Our killer is so relentless that he sneaks in n out the hospital so many times but at the same time he is a very incompetent one as he is not able to finish wht he started. I found the killer to be dumb too. What kinda serial killer brings home a girl, rapes n tortures her n then leaves her alive n that too when the whole area's police r on the lookout for him. What kinda killer leaves all his victim's photos easily accessible. By the way William Shatner was totally wasted.

After a heated TV press conference, feminist journalist and non-violence advocate Deborah Ballin (Lee Grant) returns home to find her house guest dead and sweaty, woman-hating, stress-ball-squeezing psycho Colt Hawker (Michael Ironside) ready to slash her to ribbons. After being stabbed twice, Deborah manages to get the attention of her neighbors and Colt flees. She's taken to County General Hospital, where she awaits surgery on her injured arm, while Colt decides to finish the job he wasn't able to complete earlier by continually sneaking his way back into the hospital and attacking her. Several other women inadvertently become involved, including sweet nurse Sheila (Linda Purl), a divorced single mother of two, and Lisa (Lenore Zann), a loose-living party girl who Colt takes home and beats severely, but lets live. Colt's homicidal misogyny is explained by a series of brief flashbacks that involve his mother flinging a pot of hot oil into his father's face, which of course has made him a maladjusted and impotent man who detests strong, independent women... just like Deborah.VISITING HOURS has a lot going for it, especially in comparison to other films of this type from the early 80s. For starters, the budget is relatively high for a change, affording this very glossy production values and cinematography. The cast is more than competent, with Oscar-winner Grant as an atypically headstrong and authoritative middle-aged lead in a subgenre usually dominated by teenagers. Though she's not particularly likable or sympathetic, Purl's strong working class supporting character IS and helps to balance that all out. Genre regular Ironside also does an effective job playing the creepy psycho, while a toupee-sporting William Shatner is given nothing to do as Grant's agent. The script is quite ambitious as well in its attempt to bridge the gap between exploitative, disreputable slasher flicks and more socially-conscious thrillers. And yet all the above combined cannot save this film because it becomes an implausible mess after the first 20 or so minutes. That's a true shame considering the opening scenes offer up a few good scares and some genuine suspense.What totally killed this film for me is its incompetent portrayal of the hospital staff and the police. The psycho manages to get into the hospital and has full access to Grant no less than FOUR DIFFERENT TIMES, which is completely ridiculous. The first time he poses as a florist and kills a patient and a nurse who are in the room Deborah was originally supposed to be in. Instead of informing her her life is in danger, the staff instead keep it a secret and she has to find out secondhand from another patient what's going on. The killer then sneaks in a second and a third time, killing people each time he's there, but nothing much is done. My question is: Where the hell are the security guards in this film? That's right, they're all hanging out in the downstairs lobby and none happen to be on the same floor people keep getting attacked on. At one point, Shatner's character assuredly tells Grant not to worry after several murders because "They've got a great security system here," which literally made me laugh out loud. He deserves some kind of award for being able to say that line with a straight face.Any patient - let alone a celebrity patient like Grant's character - in her predicament would not only have several armed guards posted right outside her door at all times, but also guards in each hallway of the floor she's on. Not only that, but the hospital would have guards patrolling the outside perimeter of the hospital and ones in front of each and every door of that place considering the murders that keep occurring there. I also couldn't figure out why there was no attempt to relocate Deborah; if not to a new hospital entirely (she just has an injured ARM for Christ's sake!) but to another floor or even another room. Of course if this film used even the most basic of logic, there may not be a film at all. Then again, is that really such a bad thing considering how stupid this turned out?Unfortunately, the idiocy isn't just confined to inept security, but is liberally spread through the rest of the film as well. Shatner's character manages to convince Grant to stay in the hospital just one more night by saying he won't leave her side and then in his very next scene is off at another location doing something else entirely. Toward the end, Purl's character gets a phone call from the psycho, who's at her home. With her children's lives in danger and knowledge of the psycho's whereabouts, she gets flustered and babbles some frantic, incomprehensible gibberish to one officer before rushing home all by herself! She could have simply said "Hey, the killer is at my house RIGHT NOW, how about you gather up a few dozen men and follow me over?" Nope, instead she rushes home in a panic and needlessly gets herself stabbed. This is followed by Colt getting into Grant's room yet again and chasing her around through empty corridors because we've already established the staff and police don't seem to care that people are being murdered right and left in this place. I can handle a few dumb moments in my horror films, but this simply has far too many of them.I noticed defenders like to point out that it's "just a horror movie." And to that I say "Precisely!" This is indeed just another horror movie. It's not a good horror movie or a memorable horror movie or a thought- provoking horror movie. It's just another horror movie lost in a faceless sea of other poorly conceived and forgettable ones. There's a good reason this isn't very well-known.

Watching this one had me taking a lot of breaks to do something. I mean it's difficult to make a hospital look exciting. See the wheelchairs drift around the hallway corners! A lot of typical horror ploys can be found throughout this one. Kudos to Michael Ironside who plays one effectively messed up eccentric. Why did Lee Grant look like she went bobbing in talcum powder? That's not a knife..it's a safety baton.This one needed more Shatner. In his short scenes, he shows great concern through facial expressions. He probably got confused wondering where the script had gone. I have to admit..Bill's appearance at the crime scene is the funniest scene ever.