#28 BLACK PHONE

Starring Mason Thames, Madeleine McGraw, Jeremy Davies, James Ransone and Ethan Hawk. Written by Scott Derrickson and C.Robert Cargill, based on the book 'The Black Phone' by Joe Hill. Directed by Scott Derrickson. Budget $16-18 million , running time 103 minutes.

Set in the 21st Century's version of the 1950s, otherwise known as the 1970s, when everything was so much better, music (disco), movies (Star Wars) and serial killers (John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy, Dennis Rader etc etc) comes this, a supernatural  serial killer movie, which jumping on the band wagon of Stranger Things and It:Chapter 1, uses teenagers as its protagonists. In Black Phone, a sinisterly masked serial killer dubbed The Grabber (not to be confused with the Graboids from Tremors) is abducting young men from the streets of a Denver suburb and leaving black balloons behind as his calling card, but what happens next...

What happens next is a middling, utterly un-scary horror film, which promises much and delivers very little. It's well crafted, the performances are okay and it's not shit, but that's about it. The trailer promised much, but sadly the main event falls short. Ethan Hawke, who gets star billing is very much absent from proceedings and one is left wondering what exactly it is he brings to the proceedings. As screen killers go his Grabber is genuinely inept, his modus operandi is poorly executed and undefined and it seems all he brings to the proceedings is a series of masks, that scream more an attempt at potential product placement than anything else.  

The supernatural element initially sounds very intriguing but it's all handled in such a pointless way, The Grabber's previous victims all contact the latest victim, Finney (Mason Thames) via a disconnected telephone in the basement of The Grabber's basement and give him advice and tips on how to survive and beat The Grabber. Meanwhile Fin's sister, Gwen (Madeleine McGraw), a foul-mouthed and hilarious 12 year-old with psychic abilities tries to convince the bungling police department she can help. While the deceased victims each provide little life lessons or tips that initially prove to be useless until...

Well, that would be telling. Let's just say, payback's a bitch. 

There's also the introduction of a new character well into the second half of the movie which borders on comedy relief. There's a lot I liked about this film, the lead characters Finny and his sister, Gwen are interesting, as is their school life, they provide the emotional core to the film, but their physically-abusive, alcoholic father (Jeremy Davis) is so violent he ends up being nothing more than a caricature. Likewise the two cops assigned to crack the case are just bumbling Thompson Twin clones, adding to the film's uncomfortable comedy edge. 

You're left wondering why the cops and authorities are so inept, and why they have such difficulty catching the Grabber, particularly when he and his job are at last revealed (along with his black painted and black windowed van that stalks the streets, makes him so obviously the villain) but it appears the cops only go looking for him at night, or in the rain. But that makes sense since they have to be inept for the film's central conceit to work. Likewise you need to ignore the gapping wound like plot holes that intrude on the proceedings and make you go, 'hang on, why doesn't he just do that?'

Whereas this takes pages from the IT and Stranger Things playlist, it obviously learnt no lessons from either and doesn't really know what to do with the intriguing set up and charismatic leads and so pisses it all up basement wall. 

Not a total cluster fuck, just not particularly exciting, scary or intriguing. 

6/10